Mtlt 


Ui'y- 


iilU' 


^i- 


m 


'  1     li 


.'     i  i  ■  . 

i 

1 

1 

1 

1 
.11 

LIBRARY 

OF  THK 

University  of  California. 


OrFT    OF 


Class 


jmotiem  aselfgfou^  laroblemis 

EDITED    BY 

AMBROSE    WHITE    VERNON 


THE  CHURCH  AND 
LABOR 


BY 


CHARLES  STELZLE 

I. 

SUPERINTENDENT,  PRESBYTERIAN  DEPARTMENT 
OF  CHURCH  AND  LABOR 


BOSTON    AND   NEW   YORK 

HOUGHTON   MIFFLIN  COMPANY 

IQIO 


v*-?^ 


COPYRIGHT,   191 0,   BY  CHARLES   STELZLE 


ALL   RIGHTS   RESERVED 


Published  February  iqio 


C  C         t      1- 

<^l     t    c, 
(   *    c  t    c 


PREFACE 

When  the  writing  of  this  book  was  first 
considered,  it  was  a  question  as  to  whether 
the  discussion  should  deal  with  methods  of 
work  or  with  the  spirit  of  the  Church  and 
Labor.    It  was  decided  that  the  latter  is  of 
greater  importance,  hence  this  selection  of 
the  treatment  of  the  subject.    It  is  frankly 
acknowledged    that    better    things    might 
truthfully  have  been  said  about  the  Church 
and  worse  things  about  Labor,  but  there  is 
already  considerable  literature  telling  about 
what  the  Church  has  done  and  what  La- 
bor has  left  undone,  —  especially  when  the 
question  is  discussed  from  the  viewpoint 
of  the  Church.  JThis  book  is  written  largely 
from  the  standpoint  of  Labor.  An  attempt 
irmade  to  present  the  spirit  which  under- 
lies the  labor  movement,  and  to  show  that 

V 

23543G 


PREFACE 

the  Church  must  understand  this  spirit  if 
it  is  to  measure  up  to  its  opportunity. 

Charles  Stelzle. 

New  York,  January  i,  1910. 


CONTENTS 

I.  The  Attitude  of  Labor  toward  the 

Church  i 

II.  The  Attitude  of  the  Church  toward 

Labor  34 

III.  The    Ethical   Value   of   the   Labor 

AIovement  60 

IV.  Why    Church    and    Labor   May   Co- 

operate 84 


>         •)  O    4  »   J 


THE  CHURCH  AND   LABOR 


THE    ATTITUDE    OF    LABOR    TOWARD    THE 
CHURCH 

Recently,  while  studying  conditions 
among  European  workingmen,  I  visited  the 
People's  Palace  in  Brussels.  From  basement 
to  topmost  story  the  building  was  crowded 
with  artisans  and  their  families,  who  had 
come  to  enjoy  the  evening  in  social  inter- 
course, to  receive  instruction  in  one  of  the 
many  classes,  to  listen  to  the  lectures  in  the 
great  auditorium,  or  to  find  diversion  or  to 
seek  knowledge  through  association  with 
smaller  groups  or  clubs  which  were  inter- 
ested in  the  same  amusements,  the  same 
studies,  the  same  problems  that  brought 
them  to  the  buildinc:.    Never  had  I  seen 


THE  CHURCH  AND  LABOR 

better  behavior,  nor  greater  enthusiasm,  nor 
more  whole-souled  freedom  among  work- 
ingmen.  And  the  secret  of  it  all  was  that 
this  magnificent  building  was  theirs.  They, 
themselves,  had  spent  one  million  two  hun- 
dred thousand  francs  upon  it.  Here  were 
twenty-four  thousand  families  of  working 
people,  who  were  conducting  their  "  self- 
help  organization  "  upon  a  basis  which  was 
thoroughly  democratic.  They  had  a  capital 
of  three  million  francs,  controlled  twenty- 
four  stores  of  different  kinds  in  various  parts 
of  the  city,  and  supported  five  additional 
branch  social  centres  in  the  suburbs. 

As  the  caretaker  escorted  me  from  room 
to  room,  we  came  to  what  appeared  to  be  a 
lodge  chamber,  at  the  far  end  of  which  was 
a  platform  —  not  very  deep,  and  which,  ap- 
parently, was  not  used  at  all  for  the  purpose 
of  speechmaking  or  recital.  The  caretaker 
stopped  when  we  reached  this  curious- 
looking  structure,  and  on  his  pulling  a  string, 

2 


THE  ATTITUDE  OF  LABOR 

a  curtain,  apparently  placed  against  the  wall, 
parted;  he  flashed  on  a  row  of  footlights, 
and  I  saw  a  great  picture  of  Jesus  Christ, 
with  hand  uplifted.  He  smiled  as  he  saw 
my  amazement,  for  we  had  been  talking 
about  clubs  and  classes,  about  cooperation 
and  socialism,  and  not  a  word  about  religion 
or  anything  that  suggested  it. 

"Why  do  you  have  this  picture  of  Jesus 
here  ?  "  I  asked.  "  Are  many  of  your  people 
Christian?" 

"No,"  he  replied;  "I  do  not  know  of 
any  who  go  to  the  churches."  And  seeing 
my  increasing  wonderment,  he  added,  "We 
believe  that  Jesus  was  the  first  socialist,  and 
that  he  was  the  great  friend  of  the  working- 
man.  Jesus  we  honor,  but  for  the  churches 
who  call  themselves  by  his  name,  we  have 
very  little  respect." 

He  then  told  me  that  the  Catholic  church 
across  the  way  had  offered  them  twenty-five 
thousand  francs  for  the  picture. 

3 


THE  CHURCH  AND  LABOR 

As  I  passed  out  of  the  building  that  night, 
I  looked  across  at  the  church,  —  dark, 
dismal,  uninviting,  while  the  people  cease- 
lessly thronged  the  streets,  seeking  that 
which  would  satisfy  their  restless,  weary 
souls.  And  all  that  the  Church  could  see 
in  that  splendid  social  centre  of  the  people 
was  a  rather  poor  painting  of  the  Son  of 
God!  To  the  Church,  with  its  devotion  to 
art  and  to  aesthetics,  this  picture  was  the 
source  of  power  with  the  people,  and  it 
thought  to  purchase  it,  so  that  the  picture 
might  become  its  own,  hoping  thus  to  win 
back  those  who  had  become  alienated.  But 
it  was  n't  the  picture,  —  it  was  life  and  hope 
and  enthusiasm  that  were  winning  the  day. 
Far  better  were  the  stained-glass  windows 
and  the  paintings  in  the  church,  more  beau- 
tiful the  music,  more  refined  the  service, 
than  anything  of  a  like  character  ever  seen 
or  heard  in  this  People's  Palace.  But  not 
through  these  things  could  the  Church  ever 

4 


THE  ATTITUDE  OF  LABOR 

hope  to  attract  men.  It  was  the  spirit  —  the 
atmosphere  —  that  pervaded  the  institution 
across  the  way  that  told  the  story. 

The  spirit  of  democracy  has  gripped  the 
people.  This  is  the  dominating  influence 
in  our  twentieth-century  problems.  And 
whether  we  discuss  the  workingman  in 
America  or  in  England,  in  Turkey  or  in 
Russia,  we  shall  find  that  here  is  the  force 
that  is  fighting  its  way  to  the  front  in  spite 
of  every  obstacle.  For  a  long  time  the 
people  fought  for  religious  democracy,  and 
they  won.  Then,  for  hundreds  of  years  they 
shed  their  blood  upon  many  a  battlefield  in 
their  struggle  for  political  democracy,  and 
they  conquered.  They  are  now  fighting  for 
industrial  democracy,  and  no  human  power 
can  stop  their  onward  march.  But  even  in 
the  things  in  which  they  have  already  been 
victorious,  they  are  demanding  the  heritage 
of  their  fathers  which  has  been  stolen  from 
them.    That  which  has  cost  the  best  blood 

5 


THE  CHURCH  AND  LABOR 

of  the  human  race  has  been  purloined  by 
grafters  and  unscrupulous  politicians.  The 
cry  of  the  people  has  gone  up  to  heaven 
that  God  should  again  manifest  his  power 
in  behalf  of  the  common  people, — those 
who  once  heard  Jesus  gladly. 

Five  hundred  thousand  men  in  Great 
Britain  are  formed  into  a  brotherhood; 
practically  all  of  whom  are  workingmen. 
Significant,  indeed,  is  the  fact  that  they  have 
selected  as  their  battle-hymn  the  fine  old 
poem  written  by  Ebenezer  Elliott,  son  of 
a  Rotherham  iron-founder,  and  sometimes 
known  as  "  the  Robert  Burns  of  England." 

When  wilt  Thou  save  the  people? 

O  God  of  mercy,  when? 
Not  kings  alone,  but  nations  ! 

Not  thrones  and  crowns,  but  men  ! 
Flowers  of  thy  heart,  O  God,  are  they; 
Let  them  not  pass,  like  weeds,  away  — 
Their  heritage  a  sunless  day. 
God  save  the  people  ! 

6 


THE  ATTITUDE  OF  LABOR 

Shall  crime  bring  crime  forever, 

Strength  aiding  still  the  strong? 
Is  it  thy  will,  O  Father, 

That  man  shall  toil  for  wrong? 
*'  No,"  say  thy  mountains  :  "  No,"  Thy 

skies ; 
Man's  clouded  sun  shall  brightly  rise, 
And  songs  ascend  instead  of  sighs ; 
God  save  the  people  ! 

When  wilt  Thou  save  the  people? 

O  God  of  mercy,  when? 
The  people.  Lord,  the  people, 

Not  thrones  and  crowns,  but  men ; 
God  save  the  people  ;  Thine  they  are, 
Thy  children,  as  thine  angels  fair ; 
From  vice,  oppression,  and  despair, 

God  save  the  people  ! 

In  this  they  are  expressing  the  hope  of 
the  masses,  who  are  no  longer  overawed 
by  pomp  and  show,  by  wealth  and  power, 
nor  by  the  people  whose  doings  the  histo- 
rian records  while  he  forgets  all  about  our 
common  humanity. 

7 


THE  CHURCH  AND  LABOR 

In  any  discussion  as  to  the  attitude  of 
labor  toward  the  Church,  this  larger  influ- 
ence must  always  be  borne  in  mind,  for  it 
has  more  to  do  with  the  changing  social 
atmosphere  among  the  masses  than  has  any 
other  single  factor.  This  hope  of  the  com- 
ing democracy  has  altered  the  life  of  the 
people  in  even  the  most  distressing  tene- 
ment districts.  While  there  is  still  the  same 
povert}^,  and  in  some  sections  even  more 
of  it,  nevertheless,  the  people  have  taken 
on  new  spirit  and  new  life,  and  the  meanest 
proletarian  looks  forward  to  the  day  when 
he  and  his  children  shall  come  into  their 
inheritance,  and  when  they  shall  enjoy  the 
larger,  fuller  life,  which,  down  in  their 
hearts,  they  believe  God  intended  for  them. 

The  occasion  of  one  of  the  most  bitter 
criticisms  of  the  Church  by  the  working- 
man  is  his  belief  that  the  Church  as  an 
institution  has  always  stood  in  the  way  of 
his  material  progress.    He  declares  that  the 

8 


THE  ATTITUDE  OF  LABOR 

Church  has  always  upheld  the  existing 
order  of  things,  no  matter  how  hard  he  may 
have  been  pressed  by  these  conditions.  It 
has  always  stood  by  the  ruling  class,  because 
it  believed  that  its  very  life  depended  upon 
this  class,  and  it  did  not  dare  to  oppose  the 
men  or  the  government  which  gave  it  sup- 
port. The  workingman  tells  us  that  the 
Church,  because  of  its  extreme  conserva- 
tism, has  always  been  the  last  institution  to 
accept  any  reform  measure  which  may  have  h  j,^^ 
been  introduced,  and  that  it  has  been  liter-  J^>^ 
ally,  compelled  to  fall  into  line.  He  argues 
that,  no  matter  what  inference  concerning 
freedom  from  slavery  the  preachers  of  our 
day  may  draw  from  the  teachings  of  Jesus 
Christ  and  the  apostles,  nevertheless,  the 
Church  actually  advocated  slavery  less  than 
one  hundred  years  ago,  because  the  gov- 
erning class  owned  the  slaves.  And  even 
after  the  country  decided  that  slavery 
.  was    a    curse    and    that    it    must  go,    and 

9 


THE  CHURCH  AND  LABOR 

after  men  outside  the  Church  accepted  the 
conditions  against  which  they  had  fought, 
and  sacrificed  nearly  everything  that  was 
worth  while  because  of  their  convictions, 
the  great  denominations  went  on  quarreling 
concerning  these  issues;  and,  even  in  our 
own  day,  some  of  the  churches  in  the  North 
and  in  the  South  cannot  work  in  harmony 
because  of  these  old  prejudices. 

The  workingman  looks  upon  these  ha- 
treds with  contempt,  and  wonders  how  it 
is  going  to  benefit  him  and  his  class  to 
become  identified  with  an  institution  which 
contains  so  much  bitterness  with  regard  to 
dead  issues,  while,  as  a  matter  of  fact,  there 
is  more  real  brotherhood  exhibited  in  his 
own  organizations.  The  narrowness  of  the 
Church  in  this  respect  repels  him.  It  is  true 
that  this  situation  has  been  greatly  exag- 
gerated in  his  own  mind,  but  there  is  suffi- 
cient ground  for  this  prejudice  to  give  him 
fairly  good  cause  for  his  criticism. 

lO 


THE  ATTITUDE  OF  LABOR 

The  workingman  believes  that  the  ChuTch 
has  not  altogether  gotten  rid  of  its  favorit-   ' 
ism  toward  the  capitalist  class.     He  in^ists.^ 
that  in  nearly  every  struggle  for  better  con- 
ditions, the  Church  either  holds  itself  aloof 
from  him,  or  else  comes  out  openly  against 
him.  In  its  strenuous  insistence  that  "it  re- 
presents all   classes  and  therefore  cannot 
take  sides,"  it  happens  that  the  Church  does 
not  represent  any  class,  but  earns  the  con- 
tempt of  all  classes.  It  is  neither  respected  ? 
by  the  powerful,  whose  interests  are  con- 
served because  of  its  silence,  nor  honored 
by  the  lowly,  whose  struggles  it  ignores. 

The  Church  criticises  the  workingman 
because  of  the  methods  which  he  adopts, 
declaring  that  it  cannot  stand  sponsor  for 
such  unchristian  ideals  and  practices,  for- 
getting that  one  need  not  go  very  far  back 
into  its  own  history  to  find  duplicated  nearly 
everything  that  we  deplore  in  Organized 
Labor  to-day,  even  down  to  the  boycotting 

II 


THE  CHURCH  AND  LABOR 

and  the  slugging.      To  quote  from  Dean 
Hodges  :  — 

The  spirit  in  England,  for  example,  in  the  course 
of  the  ecclesiastical  disturbances  of  the  reigns  of 
Henry,  Edward,  Mary,  and  Elizabeth,  was  closely 
sfkin  to  that  which  animates  the  union  at  its  worst.  The 
matter  then  at  stake  was  the  religious  supremacy  of 
England.  The  establishment  for  the  time  being  was 
to  all  intents  and  purposes  a  union.  In  the  reign  of 
Mary,  the  union  was  the  United  Catholics  of  England. 
They  were  determined  that  no  non-unionist  should 
hold  ecclesiastical  office  in  that  realm,  and  that  no 
citizen  should  be  baptized,  or  confirmed,  or  receive 
the  sacrament  of  the  altar,  or  be  married,  or  be  buried, 
except  at  the  hands  of  an  official  of  the  union.  Non- 
unionists  were  insulted,  fined,  forbidden  the  right  of 
assembly,  and  boycotted.  Some  of  the  more  obstinate 
and  aggressive  were  put  to  death.  Cranmer,  Ridley, 
and  Latimer  were  burned  at  the  stake  as  non-union 
bishops.  In  Elizabeth's  day  the  union  was  the 
Brotherhood  of  Anglican  Churchmen.  In  Cromwell's 
day,  it  was  the  Amalgamated  Association  of  Congre- 
gationalists  and  Presbyterians.  They  all  behaved 
alike,  doing  the  same  kind  of  thing  for  which  we 

12 


THE  ATTITUDE  OF  LABOR 

now  reprobate  the  workingman.  So  they  did  in  New 
England,  when  they  whipped  the  non-union  Baptists 
and  the  non-union  Quakers.  It  all  belongs  together. 
Whoever  would  understand  what  the  union  means  to 
the  working  class,  has  but  to  read  Church  history. 
The  unionist  is  actuated  by  the  same  motives  which 
made  good  men  persecute  their  brethren.  We  have 
now  grown  wiser.  We  have  many  of  us  come  to 
understand  that  no  cause  is  advanced  by  that  sort  of 
strife.  The  unionists  will  learn  the  same  lesson.  In 
the  meantime,  let  every  offense  of  his  against  the  law 
and  order  of  the  community,  and  against  the  liberty 
of  the  citizen,  be  sharply  punished  ;  but  let  us  remem- 
ber how  our  fathers  acted,  how  conscientiously  and 
how  mistakenly. 

We  find  the  Church  advocating  certain  of 
the  practices  of  the  trades-union,  to  which, 
however,  it  objects  in  the  union  itself.  Some 
Presbyteries  will  not  permit  a  minister  to 
accept  a  call  to  a  church  if  the  amount  of  the 
salary  offered  is  not  up  to  the  standard  or 
"union  rate."  The  American  Presbyterian 
General  Assembly  of  1909  voted  in  favor  of 

13 


THE  CHURCH  AND  LABOR 

a  "  minimum  rate  "  which  shall  be  paid  a 
minister,  although,  of  course,  it  has  n't  the 
power  to  enforce  its  "  scale."  This  is  left  in 
the  hands  of  Presbyteries,  if  they  desire  to 
make  it  operative,  and  some  of  them  are 
doing  it. 

It  is  true  that  the  ministers'  association  is 
not  a  labor  union,  in  that  it  bars  out  any- 
body who  desires  to  preach  because  he  does 
not  possess  a  "union  card,"  or,  to  speak  ec- 
clesiastically, his  ordination  papers.  But  in 
actual  practice,  the  ministers'  associations 
guard  more  jealously  the  rights  of  their 
membership  than  does  the  average  labor 
union.  This  is  justified,  because  everything 
must  be  done  "  decently  and  in  order  ";  but 
the  trades-unionist  makes  the  same  claim. 
He,  too,  recognizes  that  there  may  be  su- 
perior men  who  can  afford  to  remain  out  of 
the  union,  and  who  will  not  jeopardize  the 
well-being  of  the  craft,  just  as  there  are  some 
men  who  may  preach  effectively  and  help- 


THE  ATTITUDE  OF  LABOR 

full}^  practice  the  functions  of  the  minister, 
even  though  not  ordained;  but  there  are 
vast  numbers  of  others  who  need  to  be 
brought  within  the  discipline  of  the  trades 
organization,  just  as  the  average  candidate 
for  the  gospel  ministry  needs  to  be  held 
within  the  bounds  prescribed  by  the  ec- 
clesiastical organization.  These  rules  are 
necessary,  not  alone  for  the  maintenance  of 
the  trades  organization  and  the  ministers' 
association,  but  for  the  good  of  society  as  a 
whole. 

However  unjust  the  workingman  may  be 
in  his  criticism  of  the  Church,  he  feels  that 
the  Church  is  unjust  in  its  criticism  of  him. 
The  Church  has  looked  merely  upon  the 
surface,  never  once  seeing  the  principles 
which  underlie  certain  of  his  actions.  He 
feels  that  the  Church  is  assuming  an  attitude 
of  Pharisaical  supremacy  which  is  not  justi- 
fied by  the  facts  as  he  knows  them,  or  as  he 
thinks  he  knows  them.    He  resents  being 

15 


THE  CHURCH  AND  LABOR 

looked  down  upon  as  a  creature  who  is  so 
far  gone  that  his  every  act  must  necessarily 
,be  vicious  or  vile.  With  his  organization 
misunderstood  and  his  actions  misconstrued, 
the  workingman  will  have  nothing  to  do 
with  an  institution  which  criticises  without 
knowledge,  and  condemns  without  investi- 
gation. It  is  amusing  to  hear  some  evangel- 
ists and  certain  preachers  report  with  great 
satisfaction  that  "  a  man  who  once  belonged 
to  a  labor  union  "  professed  conversion  or 
joined  the  Church.  As  though  the  mere  fact 
that  a  workingman  was  or  is  a  trades-union- 
ist or  even  a  socialist  is  sufficient  to  char- 
acterize him  as  a  sinner  beyond  the  ordinary 
run  of  men.  Such  a  position  on  the  part  of 
the  representatives  of  the  Church  has  dis- 
gusted large  numbers  of  intelligent  artisans. 
The  workingman  does  not  care  about  the 
ecclesiastical  discussions  which  occupy  so 
much  of  the  time  of  ministers'  organiza- 
tions, and  which  have  to  do  with  hair-split- 

i6 


THE  ATTITUDE  OF  LABOR 

ting  arguments  that  have  absolutely  no  re- 
lationship to  present-clay  human  problems. 
The  workingman  is  not  particularly  at- 
tracted by  the  preaching  of  a  liberal  theo- 
logy, as  so  many  who  are  not  workingmen 
are  insisting;  because,  if  he  were,  the  Uni- 
tarian and  the  Universalist  churches  would 
be  crowded  by  workingmen;  but  he  has  no 
patience  with  a  Church  or  a  group  of  min- 
isters who  are  more  interested  in  the  dis- 


cussion of  an  abstract  point  in  tHeoTogy  than 
they  are  in  the  pressing^  moral  problems  of  the 
twentieth  century.  fTo  the  average  work- 
ingman,  the  Church  seems  more  concerned 
about  the  sweet  by  and  by  than  about  the 
bitter  here  and  now.  The  Church  seems  to 
fail  in  touching  life  in  a  human  way.  It  is  an 
institution  separate  and  apart  from  life  as 
he  knows  it.  It  does  not  get  down  to  the  ac- 
tuality of  things  as  he  has  to  do  with  them. 
The  average  workingman  feels  that  the 
average  minister  talks  about  facts  and  forces 

17 


THE  CHURCH  AND  LABOR 

which  do  not  come  within  the  range  of  his 
own  thought  and  experience.  The  working- 
man  wonders  wh}^  the  minister  spends  so 
much  time  discussing  the  social  problems 
of  the  Israelites,  the  Jebusites,  the  Hivites, 
and  the  Hittites,  and  pa3^s  so  little  attention 
to  those  of  the  Pittsburghites,  the  Chicago- 
iteSj  the  Brooklynites,  and  the  Bostonites. 
He  cannot  understand  why  the  Israels,  the 
Isaacs,  and  the  Jacobs  of  the  long  ago  should 
be  so  inuch  more  fascinating  to  the  student 
of  the  Bible  in  the  Church  and  in  the  Sun- 
day School,  than  the  Vaclavs  and  the  Giu- 
seppes  and  the  Michaels  of  the  present  day. 
The  minister  seems  to  live  in  the  clouds 
six  days  in  the  week,  coming  down  to  earth 
on  the  seventh  day  to  deliver  a  message 
which  is  supposed  to  help  men  who  are  com- 
pelled to  live  on  the  earth  every  day  in  the 
week. 

To  be  sure,  he  sometimes  sees  the  min- 
ister  on    the   street   on   Monday,   but  his 

i8 


THE  ATTITUDE  OF  LABOR 

clothes  and  his  talk  and  his  life  all  seem  to 
be  related  to  a  world  which  is  n't  the  work- 
ingman's  world.  There  are  many  excep- 
tions to  this,  but  to  the  average  workingman 
the  ministers,  as  a  whole,  are  neither  men 
nor  women,  —  they  are  in  a  class  all  their 
own.  It  may  come  as  a  shock  to  many  min- 
isters to  learn  that  their  sermons  are  on  a 
lower  intellectual  level  than  are  the  ad- 
dresses delivered  by  most  labor  leaders,  and 
that  the  language  employed  in  the  labor  hall 
is  far  more  direct  and  very  much  clearer. 
The  intelligent  workingman  has  been 
trained  in  this  environment,  and  he  scorns 
the  archaic  language  often  employed  in  the 
church  service,  and  the  circumlocutionous 
speech  of  the  minister.  And  all  the  while 
the  average  minister  feels  that  he  must 
"  come  down  "  to  the  level  of  the  worker. 
The  worker  will  not  understand  the  prob- 
lems of  theology  which  the  minister  may 
learnedly  discuss,  but  his  own  people  do 

19 


THE  CHURCH  AND  LABOR 

not  care  very  much  about  them,  for  that 
matter.  But  if  he  talks  in  real  man-fashion 
about  up-to-date  questions,  the  minister  will 
need  to  give  the  workingman  the  best  he 
has. 

Sometimes  the  workingman  has  n't  very 
much  use  for  the  Church  because  he  can- 
not see  that  the  professing  Christian  em- 
ployer treats  his  help  any  better  than  does 
the  non-Christian  employer.  He  points  to 
the  fact  that  in  nearly  every  great  industrial 
struggle  it  has  been  discovered  that  the  man 
at  the  top  was  a  churchman,  and  sometimes, 
when  the  conditions  against  which  he  has 
been  fighting  have  been  so  palpably  unjust 
that  every  one  could  see  it,  the  employer 
still  was  active  in  the  Church  as  an  office- 
bearer, without  condemnation  or  rebuke. 
Discipline  has  entirely  departed  from  the 
Church,  and  men  who  are  known  to  be 
grafters  and  law-breakers  of  the  worst  kind 
are  retained  upon  the   church  rolls.  It  is 

20 


THE  ATTITUDE  OF    LABOR 

an  unheard-of  thing  in  recent  years  for  a 
church  court  to  dismiss  a  member  because 
of  unjust  or  even  criminal  practice,  to  say 
nothing  about  the  most  outrageous  treat- 
ment of  employees.  To  many  toilers  the 
modern  Church  is  merely  a  "  trump  card  " 
in  the  hands  of  the  wealthy  classes.  They 
are  no  more  Christian  than  are  the  heathen, 
toward  whose  conversion  they  contribute 
their  ill-gotten  riches.  Indeed,  "  the  ethics 
of  many  of  them  is  lower  than  that  of  the 
jungle." 

The  laborer  tells  us  that  ministers  — but 
principally  prominent  laymen  —  have  sys- 
tematically opposed  social  reform  of  every 
description,  merely  because  it  might  reduce 
their  profits.  Child-labor  laws,  old-age  pen- 
sions, free  education,  factoiy  acts,  housing 
reforms,  and  labor  legislation  of  every  sort 
have  been  fought  by  those  who  were  promi- 
nent in  the  work  of  the  Church.  There  has 
been  no  regard  whatever  for  the   lives  of 

2  I 


THE  CHURCH  AND  LABOR 

women  and  children,  and  the  introduction  of 
safety  appliances  for  their  benefit  has  been 
opposed  most  bitterly  by  churchmen.  The 
most  strenuous  opponent  of  better  tene- 
ment-house laws  in  New  York  was  a  church 
corporation,  owner  of  some  of  the  worst 
tenements  in  the  city.  Fighting  the  passage 
of  the  Licensing  Bill  in  the  House  of  Com- 
mons last  year,  which  meant  practically  the 
abolition  of  the  saloon  in  Great  Britain,  but 
upon  the  fairest  kind  of  a  basis,  was  a  com- 
pany of  prominent  ministers  and  laymen 
who  owned  stock  in  breweries  and  distil- 
leries, while  the  labor  members  in  the 
House,  to  a  man,  fought  for  its  passage. 
Laboring  men  feel  that  whatever  they  have 
gained  in  social  reform,  they  have  won  not 
only  without  the  Church,  but  often  in  spite 
of  the  Church.  To  most  of  them  the  Church 
is  merely  a  great  institution  or  machine, 
going  through  the  motions,  but  never  actu- 
ally producing  anything;  it  is  a  hotbed  of 

22 


THE  ATTITUDE  OF  LABOR 

officialism,  filled  with  a  company  of  self- 
seekers.  Largely,  for  these  reasons,  the 
Church  is  to-day  composed  of  the  bour- 
geois and  so-called  upper  classes.  The 
workingman  —  the  artisan  and  the  laborer 
—  is  n't  present  in  very  large  numbers.  It 
is  true  that  in  some  towns,  and  even  in  some 
cities  which  are  inhabited  almost  entirely 
by  the  laboring  class,  he  is  to  be  found  in 
the  churches;  but  in  the  great  commercial 
centres,  in  which  are  found  all  classes  of 
people,  the  fact  of  the  workingman's  aliena- 
tion is  very  clearly  marked.  Not  alone  in 
the  city,  however,  does  this  condition  exist. 
The  farm-hand  is  just  as  far  removed  from 
the  Church  as  is  his  brother  in  the  town, 
because  the  country  also  has  its  social  and 
industrial  problem,  although  the  Church 
apparently  has  not  yet  realized  this  fact. 
The  country  church  might  well  look  about 
its  own  field,  to  see  wherein  it  fails  to  reach 
the  men  who  are  working  for  wages. 

23 


THE  CHURCH  AND  LABOR 

The  immigrant  workingman  is  alienated 
from  the  Church.  It  does  n't  take  him  long 
to  become  Americanized  in  this  respect,  for 
even  the  Catholic  Church  no  longer  holds 
him  to  any  extent  after  he  has  been  in  this 
country  for  a  year  or  more.  The  churches 
have  almost  no  hold  upon  the  Italian,  the 
Hungarian,  the  Bohemian,  the  Pole,  the  Rus- 
sian Jew, —  indeed,  practically  all  of  the 
races  which  are  coming  to  our  country  by 
the  million  are  or  soon  become  indifferent  to 
the  Church.  In  many  cases  this  alienation 
is  due  to  the  unchristian  and  often  the  un- 
scrupulous action  of  church  officials  in  their 
native  lands,  or  it  is  attributable  to  the  so- 
cial and  economic  conditions  under  which 
the  immigrants  are  compelled  to  live  after 
they  make  their  homes  with  us. 

In  France  and  Belgium  the  antagonism 
to  the  Church  is  quite  marked  among  work- 
ingmen.  This  is  largely  due  to  socialistic 
and  revolutionary  influence.    This  applies 

24 


THE  ATTITUDE  OF  LABOR 

to  many  other  European  countries,  particu- 
larly where  the  Church  is  dominated  by  the 
State.  In  Germany  there  is  scarcely  a  min- 
ister who  dares  come  out  openly  in  favor 
of  socialism,  even  though  he  may  believe 
in  it,  because  of  the  strong  opposition  of 
the  government  to  this  economic  doctrine. 
However,  there  are  in  Germany  two  hun- 
dred and  fifty  thousand  "  Christian  trades- 
unionists  "  who  are  identified  with  the 
Church,  and  who  are  practically  under  the 
tutelage  of  the  clergy.  They  are  despised 
by  the  socialist  wing  because  of  their  loy- 
alty to  the  Church.  In  England  the  feeling 
against  the  Church  among  the  rank  and  file 
of  workingmen  is  quite  strong,  —  as  strong, 
at  any  rate,  as  it  is  in  America,  although 
there  are  organizations  for  men  affiliated 
with  the  Church,  such  as  the  Pleasant  Sun- 
day Afternoon,  the  Brotherhood,  and  the 
Adult  Schools,  which  are  holding  large 
numbers  of  men  in  at  least  a  nominal  rela- 
ys 


THE  CHURCH  AND  LABOR 

tionship  with  the  Church.  We,  in  America, 
have  not  succeeded  in  bringing  about  such 
an  affiliation.  It  is  quite  a  remarkable  thing, 
also,  that  the  majority  of  the  labor  mem- 
bers in  Parliament  —  of  whom  there  are 
about  fifty  —  are  identified  directly  with  the 
Church.  The  chairman  of  the  Labor  Party 
in  the  House  of  Commons  is  Vice-Presi- 
dent of  the  great  Brotherhood  to  which 
reference  has  already  been  made,  and  these 
leaders  of  labor  in  Parliament  are  frequently 
called  upon  to  speak  at  religious  gatherings 
of  various  kinds,  because  of  their  sympathy 
with  the  Church.  Indeed,  most  of  the  prom- 
inent labor  leaders  in  Great  Britain  confess 
that  they  received  their  training  as  public 
speakers  in  the  class  meetings  of  the  Meth- 
odist Church,  and  many  of  them  have  been 
local  preachers.  It  is  worthy  of  notice  that 
whatever  the  rank  and  file  of  the  workers 
may  think  of  the  Church,  they  are  careful  to 
select  as  their  leaders  men  of  unquestioned 

26 


THE  ATTITUDE  OF  LABOR 

character,  and  usually  those  who  are  total 
abstainers  and  members  of  the  Church. 

Whether  or  not  the  tendency  of  the  work- 
ingman  to  remain  away  from  the  Church  is 
increasing  or  decreasing  has  been  variously 
decided.  There  are  many  students  of  this 
question  who  honestly  believe  that  the  gulf 
between  the  Church  and  Labor  is  widenino^ 
and  deepening,  and  that  there  is  really  no 
hope  of  a  closing  up  of  the  gap.  They 
prophesy  that  the  Church  will  eventually 
collapse  because  it  has  lost  the  common 
people,  upon  whom  it  has  always  depended 
for  its  very  life,  and  that  the  people  will 
build  upon  its  ruins  another  organization, 
which  shall  truly  represent  Jesus  in  the 
world.  But,  in  recent  years,  man\'  hopeful 
signs  have  appeared  upon  the  horizon,  — 
signs  hopeful  to  the  Church  and  to  the 
workingman. 

In  connection  with  a  recent  Presbyterian 
General  Assembly  meeting,  held  in  Kansas 

^1 


THE  CHURCH  AND  LABOR 

City,  the  church  and  labor  mass  meeting 
held  in  Convention  Hall  on  Sunday  after- 
noon was  attended  by  nearly  fifteen  thou- 
sand persons,  at  least  half  of  whom  were 
workingmen.  It  was  not  only  the  greatest 
meeting  of  the  Presbyterian  Assembly  in 
Kansas  City,  but  it  was  the  most  largely 
attended  meeting  in  the  over  one  hundred 
years  of  its  history.  It  is  significant  that  the 
meeting  which  holds  this  record  should  be 
one  so  largely  composed  of  that  class  which 
is  supposed  to  be  alienated  from  the  Church. 
The  writer  has  long  had  standing  offers 
from  dozens  of  cities  to  address  big  crowds 
of  workingmen  in  halls  and  theatres,  under 
the  auspices  of  central  labor  bodies.  The 
expenses  are  to  be  borne  by  the  working- 
men  themselves,  and  the  topics  discussed 
to  be  selected  by  the  speaker.  Many  such 
meetings  have  been  held,  to  the  evident 
satisfaction  of  both  the  Church  and  the 
workingmen.  Practically  every  Sunday  af- 

28 


THE  ATTITUDE  OF  LABOR 

ternoon,  during  the  winter  season,  is  em- 
ployed   in   speaking  to    mass   meetings  of 
workingmen,  sometimes  under  the  direction 
of  Young  Men's  Christian  Associations  or 
Church   Brotherhoods,  although   some    of 
the  best  meetings  are  held  by  the  churches 
themselves,    and   in  their   own    buildings. 
The  audiences  rarely  number  less  than  one 
thousand,  while  there  have  been  meetings 
at  which    ten  and   fifteen   thousand   were 
present,  the   men  themselves  cooperating 
in  making  them  successful.  The  greatest 
"labor  meetings ''being  held   to-day  are 
conducted  under   church   auspices.    They 
exceed  in  numbers  and  in   interest  those 
held   directly  under   the    auspices   of    the 
trades-unions  themselves. 

In  one  hundred  and  twenty-five  cities  in 
the  United  States  the  ministers'  associa- 
tions and  the  central  labor  unions  are  ex- 
changing fraternal  delegates,  the  ministers 
and   workingmen   regularly  meeting  with 

29 


THE  CHURCH  AND  LABOR 

each  other's  organizations,  and  freely  taking 
part  in  the  discussions.  There  are  about  one 
hundred  and  seventy-five  ministers  serving 
in  this  capacit}^  This  exchange  of  delegates 
is  resulting  in  a  more  cordial  relationship 
between  the  Church  and  Labor.  In  many 
instances  the  ministers  are  elected  to  the 
office  of  chaplain,  and  the  regular  meetings 
of  the  union  are  opened  w^ith  prayer.  This 
plan  has  the  hearty  and  unanimous  endorse- 
ment of  the  American  Federation  of  Labor, 
the  federation  having  passed  the  following 
resolution:  — 

Resolved^  That  the  American  Federation  of  La- 
bor recommends  that  all  affiliated  State  and  Cen- 
tral Bodies  exchange  fraternal  delegates  with  the 
various  State  and  City  ministerial  associations,  wher- 
ever practicable,  thus  insuring  a  better  understanding 
on  the  part  of  the  Church  and  clergy  of  the  aims  and 
objects  of  the  labor  union  movement  of  America. 

When  the  Presbyterian  Church  inaugur- 
ated its  Department  of  Church  and  Labor, 

30 


THE  ATTITUDE  OF  LABOR 

this  denomination  being  the  first  to  branch 
out  officially  in  this  direction,  the  American 
Federation  adopted  the  resolution  which 
follows:  — 

Whereas^  the  Presbyterian  Church  in  the  United 
States  of  America,  at  its  last  National  Convention, 
officially  established  a  Department  of  Church  and 
Labor  for  the  express  purpose  of  making  a  sys- 
tematic study  of  the  labor  problem  ;  and 

Whereas^  It  is  part  of  the  plan  of  this  department 
to  appoint  in  every  industrial  centre  special  commit- 
tees that  may  become  experts  in  their  knowledge  of 
every  phase  of  the  labor  movement,  so  that  they  may 
inform  the  churches  with  respect  to  the  aims  of  or- 
ganized labor ;    Therefore^  be  it 

Resolved^  That  the  American  Federation  of  La- 
bor, in  convention  assembled,  indorse  this  new  and 
significant  movement  in  the  Presbyterian  Church, 
and  we  further  recommend  that  Central  Labor  Bod- 
ies cooperate  with  this  department  and  with  its  sub- 
committees in  every  way  that  may  be  consistent,  in 
order  that  the  Church  and  the  public  at  large  may 
have  a  more  intelligent  conception  of  the  conditions 
and  aspirations  of  the  toilers. 

31 


THE  CHURCH  AND  LABOR 

Not  many  years  ago,  the  same  federation 
would  probably  have  scorned  any  sort  of  an 
approach  on  the  part  of  a  church  organ- 
ization. The  above  resolution  was  adopted 
not  only  unanimously,  but  with  considerable 
enthusiasm. 

At  a  recent  conference  of  ministers  who 
were  discussing  the  question  of  attracting 
workingmen  to  the  Church,  several  of  them, 
who  have  been  active  in  the  work  of  deal- 
ing directly  with  artisans,  —  most  of  them 
being  fraternal  delegates  to  central  labor 
bodies,  —  declared  that  the  number  of  work- 
ingmen in  their  congregations  had  grown 
from  about  ten  per  cent  to  figures  varying 
from  forty  to  sixty  per  cent. 

Church  and  Labor  throughout  the  United 
States  have,  during  the  past  four  years,  been 
observing  "  Labor  Sunday  "  on  the  Sunday 
before  Labor  Day,  by  holding  special  serv- 
ices in  the  churches,  which  have  been  at- 
tended by  thousands  of  men  who  had  not 

32 


THE  ATTITUDE  OF  LABOR 

previously  gone  to  church  in  many  years.  In 
many  cases  the  men  have  marched  in  bodies 
to  the  service  from  their  meeting-places. 

National  conventions  of  labor,  which 
heretofore  have  been  closed  to  ministers  of 
the  gospel,  are  now  opened  with  prayer  by 
local  ministers,  ministerial  fraternal  dele- 
gates are  received,  they  are  appointed  upon 
important  committees,  and  time  is  given  to 
a  discussion  of  the  relation  of  the  Church 
to  Labor,  the  addresses  of  the  ministers 
being  invariably  received  with  enthusiasm. 

These  are  some  of  the  most  conspicuous 
signs  on  Labor's  side  of  this  question.  Oth- 
ers there  are,  and  probably  of  still  greater 
significance,  but  there  are  sufficient  reasons 
why  they  should  not  be  made  public. 

While  there  is  considerable  "alienation 
of  the  workingman  from  the  Church,"  there 
is  no  other  class  of  men  among  whom  there 
is  this  conspicuous  movement  toward  the 
Church. 


II 


THE  ATTITUDE  OF  THE  CHURCH  TOWARD 

LABOR 

Thirty-three  denominations,  repre- 
senting eighteen  million  church  members 
and  nearly  forty  million  adherents,  spoke 
officially  with  reference  to  the  Church's  at- 
titude toward  Labor,  at  the  meeting  of  the 
Federal  Council  of  the  Churches  of  Christ 
in  America,  held  in  Philadelphia  in  Decem- 
ber, 1908.  The  resolutions  unanimously 
adopted  at  that  time  were  the  most  signifi- 
cant that  had  ever  come  before  a  church 
council  of  any  sort,  being  far  in  advance  of 
anything  else  passed  by  any  of  the  denom- 
inational assemblies  or  councils.  It  is  not 
possible  to  reproduce  here  the  entire  state- 
ment and  recommendations,  but  after  a 
very  bold  and  clearly  stated   presentation 

34 


THE  ATTITUDE  OF  THE  CHURCH 

of  the  industrial  situation  and  the  Church's 
relation  to  it  in  a  general  way,  the  Council 
said:  — 

We  deem  it  the  duty  of  all  Christian  people  to 
concern  themselves  directly  with  certain  practical 
industrial  problems.  To  us  it  seems  that  the  churches 
must  stand  — 

For  equal  rights  and  complete  justice  for  all  men 
in  all  stations  in  life. 

For  the  right  of  all  men  to  the  opportunity  for  self- 
maintenance,  a  right  ever  to  be  wisely  and  strongly 
safeguarded  against  encroachments  of  every  kind. 

For  the  right  of  workers  to  some  protection  against 
the  hardships  often  resulting  from  the  swift  crisis  of 
industrial  change. 

For  the  principle  of  conciliation  and  arbitration  in 
industrial  dissensions. 

For  the  protection  of  the  worker  from  dangerous 
machinery,  occupational  disease,  injuries  and  mor- 
tality. 

For  the  abolition  of  child  labor. 

For  such  regulation  of  the  conditions  of  toil  for 
women  as  shall  safeguard  the  physical  and  moral 
health  of  the  community. 

35 


THE  CHURCH  AND  LABOR 

For  the  suppression  of  the  "  sweating  system." 

For  the  gradual  and  reasonable  reduction  of  the 
hours  of  labor  to  the  lowest  practicable  point,  and 
for  that  degree  of  leisure  for  all  which  is  a  condition 
of  the  highest  human  life. 

For  a  release  from  employment  one  day  in  seven. 

For  a  living  wage  as  a  minimum  in  every  industry, 
and  for  the  highest  wage  that  each  industry  can  afford. 

For  the  most  equitable  division  of  the  products  of 
industry  that  can  be  ultimately  devised. 

For  suitable  provision  for  the  old  age  of  the  work- 
ers and  for  those  incapacitated  by  injury. 

For  the  abatement  of  poverty. 

To  the  toilers  of  America  and  to  those  who  by  or- 
ganized effort  are  seeking  to  lift  the  crushing  burdens 
of  the  poor,  and  to  reduce  the  hardships  and  uphold 
the  dignity  of  labor,  this  Council  sends  the  greeting 
of  human  brotherhood  and  the  pledge  of  sympathy 
and  of  help  in  a  cause  which  belongs  to  all  who  fol- 
low Christ. 

The  Council  recommended  to  the  several 
Christian  bodies  represented, — 

That  the  churches  more  fully  recognize,  through 
their  pulpits,  press,  and  public  assemblies,  the  great 

36 


THE  ATTITUDE  OF  THE  CHURCH 

work  of  social  reconstruction  which  is  now  in  pro- 
gress, the  character,  extent,  and  ethical  value  of  the 
labor  movement,  the  responsibilities  of  Christian 
men  for  the  formation  of  social  ideals,  and  the  obli- 
gation of  the  churches  to  supply  the  spiritual  motive 
and  standards  for  all  movements  which  aim  to  realize 
in  the  modern  social  order  the  fulfillment  of  the 
second  great  commandment,  "Thou  shalt  love  thy 
neighbor  as  thyself  "  ; 

That  the  study  of  existing  conditions  in  the  indus- 
trial world,  their  origin  and  outcome,  be  more  defin- 
itely enforced  as  an  immediate  Christian  duty ; 

That  to  this  end,  in  all  theological  seminaries,  and, 
so  far  as  practicable,  in  other  schools  and  colleges, 
there  be  established,  wherever  they  do  not  now  exist, 
courses  in  economics,  sociology,  and  the  social  teach- 
ings of  Jesus,  supplemented,  wherever  possible,  by 
investigation  of  concrete  social  facts,  and  that  study 
classes  and  reading  courses  on  social  questions  be 
instituted  in  connection  with  the  churches  and  their 
societies  to  foster  an  intelligent  appreciation  of  ex- 
isting conditions,  and  to  create  a  public  sentiment 
through  which  relief  and  reform  may  be  more  effect- 
ively secured ; 

That  the  churches,  with  quickened  zeal  and  keener 

37 


THE  CHURCH  AND  LABOR 

appreciation,  through  their  pastors,  lay  leaders,  and 
members,  wherever  possible,  enter  into  sympathetic 
and  fraternal  relations  with  workingmen,  by  candid 
public  discussion  of  the  problems  which  especially 
concern  them,  by  advocating  their  cause  when  just, 
by  finding  the  neighborly  community  of  interest,  and 
by  welcoming  them  and  their  families  to  the  uses 
and  privileges  of  the  local  churches  ; 

That  the  proper  general  authorities  of  the  denom- 
inations endeavor  by  special  bureau  or  department  to 
collate  facts  and  mould  opinion  in  the  interest  of  a 
better  understanding  between  the  Church  and  work- 
ingmen, and  particularly  to  obtain  a  more  accurate 
and  general  knowledge  of  the  meaning  of  trades- 
unionism,  and  especially  that  all  church  members 
who,  either  as  employers  or  as  members  of  trades- 
unions,  are  more  specifically  involved  in  the  practical 
problems  of  industry,  be  urged  to  accept  their  un- 
paralleled opportunity  for  serving  the  cause  of  Christ 
and  humanity  by  acting,  in  his  spirit,  as  mediators 
between  opposing  forces  in  our  modern  world  of 
work; 

That  the  Church  in  general  not  only  aim  to  so- 
cialize its  message,  to  understand  the  forces  which 
now  dispute  its  supremacy,  to  stay  by  the  people  in 

38 


THE  ATTITUDE  OF  THE  CHURCH 

the  effort  to  solve  with  them  their  problems,  but  also 
modify  its  own  equipment  and  procedure  in  the  in- 
terest of  more  democratic  administration  and  larger 
social  activity ; 

That  the  Church  fail  not  to  emphasize  its  own  re- 
lation, throughout  the  centuries  and  in  the  life  of  the 
world  to-day,  to  the  mighty  movements  which  make 
for  the  betterment  of  social  and  industrial  conditions. 

These  resolutions  will  stand  for  many 
years  to  come  as  the  Church's  expression 
of  its  sympathy  for  the  masses.  Already 
they  have  been  extensively  printed  in  the 
labor  press  of  America,  and  the  various 
denominations  are  using  them  as  their  offi- 
cial statements  with  reference  to  the  social 
problems  of  the  times. 

Some  of  the  leading  denominations  have 
established  departments  in  the  interest  of 
workingmen,  notable  among  them  in  tlie 
United  States  being  the  Presbyterians, 
the  Congregationalists,  the  Unitarians,  and 
the   Episcopalians,  while    the    Methodists 

39 


THE  CHURCH  AND  LABOR 

and  the  Baptists  have  appointed  strong  com- 
mittees of  social  service.  In  Canada,  the 
Methodists  and  the  Presbyterians  have  de- 
partments or  bureaus  of  social  reform,  and 
a  number  of  the  churches  in  England,  Scot- 
land, and  Australia  are  considering  the  mat- 
ter of  inaugurating  similar  enterprises.  In 
most  cases,  these  departments  and  com- 
mittees have  secretaries  or  superintendents 
vv^ho  give  all  their  time  to  the  work,  outlining 
methods  of  work  to  be  carried  on  by  the 
individual  churches  and  ministers'  organ- 
izations. 

Through  the  work  of  these  departments, 
the  denominations  are  expressing  their 
attitude  toward  labor.  In  every  case,  this 
expression  has  been  most  sympathetic.  It 
cannot  truthfully  be  said  by  the  working- 
man  that,  in  so  far  as  the  official  declarations 
of  the  churches  are  concerned,  they  have 
been  negligent  or  indifferent.  There  is  little 
to  be  desired  in  this  respect.  The  unfort- 

40 


THE  ATTITUDE  OF  THE  CHURCH 

unate  thing  is  that  the  churches  have  not 
always  lived  up  to  their  own  ideals.  They 
have  been  too  easily  satisfied  with  resolu- 
tions, and  they  have  done  too  little  in  the 
way  of  practical  demonstration  of  their  sym- 
pathy. 

For  many  years,  some  of  the  churches 
have  maintained  "social  unions"  and  so- 
cieties "for  improving  the  conditions  of 
workino'men  "  and  "the  securins^  of  social 
justice."  Elaborate  organizations  have  been 
perfected,  with  long  lists  of  bishops  and 
other  church  dignitaries  as  officers,  some 
of  whom  have  long  since  forgotten  that  they 
had  been  thus  honored.  An  extensive  liter- 
ature on  social  questions  has  been  issued, 
and  "  mass  meetings  "  have  been  held  in 
the  interest  of  these  enterprises.  But  out- 
side of  their  own  little  coteries,  practically 
nobody  has  known  of  their  existence.  The 
workingmen,  who  were  supposed  to  be  tlic 
direct  recipients  of  whatever  blessings  miglit 

4^ 


THE  CHURCH  AND  LABOR 

flow  from  them,  knew  nothing  about  them. 
Organizations  of  this  sort  rarely  meet  with 
the  success  which  they  deserve,  but  in  most 
cases  they  are  mere  fads  of  the  Church,  got- 
ten up  by  some  earnest  souls  who  have  come 
to  have  an  academic  interest  in  "the  masses." 
But  when  they  have  come  up  against  the 
blood  and  the  fire  of  the  labor  problem, 
they  have  usually  lost  heart,  and  they  have 
been  easily  persuaded  to  desist.  Meanwhile, 
they  have  convinced  themselves  that  they 
were  actually  making  a  great  impression 
upon  the  Church  and  upon  the  working- 
man.  The  trouble  of  it  is  that  these  men 
and  women  have  been  overshadowed  by  a 
disheartening  institutionalism  and  formal- 
ism. There  is  a  lack  of  genuine  enthusiasm 
in  the  Church  for  such  endeavors.  One  may 
secure  the  passage  of  social  resolutions  by 
the  score  at  any  church  convention.  There 
are  piled-up  documents  of  this  sort  which 
might  give  any  church  court  occasion  for 

42 


THE  ATTITUDE  OF  THE  CHURCH 

feeling  proud  of  its  attitude  with  reference 
to  the  social  question.  But  in  scarcely  a 
sinsrle  instance  are  these  resolutions  ever 
put  into  actual  practice.  It  is  a  comfortable 
feeling  to  know  that  they  are  there,  to  be 
referred  to  when  any  one,  especially  the 
workingman,  questions  the  relationship  of 
the  Church  to  the  problems  that  are  per- 
plexing him. 

But  why  not  be  perfectly  honest  about 
it,  and  confess  that  these  resolutions  mean 
absolutely  nothing;  that  they  are  the  work 
of  some  man  who  dared  to  challenge  the 
Church,  and  the  Church,  not  caring  to  op- 
pose, simply  swallowed  them  at  one  gulp, 
but  with  really  no  thought  that  anything 
would  ever  be  done  with  them? 

The  Church  will  never  bring  about  the 
great  social  reforms  which  are  pressing, 
until  a  few  strong,  fearless  men  are  willing 
to  sacrifice  everything,  if  need  be,  to  accom- 
plish the  objects  which  are  very  clearly  set 

43 


THE  CHURCH  AND  LABOR 

forth  in  our  convention-passed  resolutions. 
This  does  not  mean  that  any  set  of  men 
may  bring  this  to  pass;  they  must  be  men 
who  have  a  special  gift  for  such  a  task,  — 
men  who  can  see  and  feel,  and  are  willing 
to  suffer,  if  need  be,  even  as  Christ  suffered. 
And  the  Church,  itself,  will  bring  to  them 
the  bitterest  suffering. 

There  is  no  doubt  that  the  Church  has 
always  been  the  whitest  light  in  history. 
No  matter  how  dark  the  age,  the  Church 
has  stood  out  as  a  torch;  it  was  sometimes 
a  smoky  torch,  but  it  was  ofttimes  the  only 
torch  that  showed  men  the  way.  But  the 
masses  to-day  are  not  very  much  concerned 
about  what  the  Church  has  been  in  his- 
tory. They  know  that  the  people  in  the 
churches  to-day  had  ver}^  little  to  do  with 
the  glorious  traditions  of  the  Church,  and 
they  are  demanding  that  they  indicate  their 
interest  in  present-day  problems.  And  the 
masses  are  right.  If  the  Church  cares  about 

44 


THE  ATTITUDE  OF  THE  CHURCH 

those  things  which  trouble  the  people,  it 
should  come  out  so  clearly,  not  only  in  the 
passing  of  line-sounding  resolutions,  but  in 
the  actual  performance  of  its  duty,  that  there 
would  no  longer  be  any  doubt  in  their  minds 
as  to  its  sincerity. 

In  scarcely  a  moral  and  civic  campaign 
in  these  days  is  the  Church  as  such  con- 
sidered to  be  the  leader,  if,  indeed,  it  is  even 
a  direct  participant.  Few  pay  any  attention 
to  the  actions  taken  by  ministers'  associa- 
tions; and  Church  Brotherhoods,  and  other 
men's  organizations  in  the  Church  are  no- 
toriously weak  in  municipal  reform,  when 
one  thinks  of  their  possibilities.  At  their 
conventions,  they  threaten  and  scold;  but 
the  statesmen,  even  those  who  arc  in  the 
Church,  prefer  to  do  their  work  through 
some  other  agency,  because,  as  one  of  them 
put  it,  "  these  church  men  don't  stay  on  the 
job."  If  the  Protestant  churches  of  Amer- 
ica, for  instance,  with  their  millions  of  ad- 

45 


THE  CHURCH  AND  LABOR 

herents,  were  to  become  really  alive,  there 
is  absolutely  nothing  in  the  way  of  reform, 
municipal  and  social,  which  they  could  not 
accomplish,  in  so  far,  of  course,  as  men  may 
do  these  things.  The  Church  is  responsible 
for  the  injustices  and  the  wrongs  now  being 
suffered  by  vast  numbers  of  people,  because 
the  Church  could  right  them  if  it  would;  not 
all  the  wrongs,  to  be  sure,  but  most  of  them. 
This  does  not  mean  that  a  church  as- 
sembly or  council  could  accomplish  these 
things,  especially  by  the  passing  of  resolu- 
tions. But  if  the  men  who  are  in  the  Church, 
and  who  constitute  the  Church  if  anybody 
does,  were  to  resolve  that  these  evils  should 
be  wiped  out,  they  would  disappear,  because 
those  men  have  the  money  and  the  influence 
and  know  what  needs  to  be  done.  Those 
outside  the  Church  cannot  be  held  respons- 
ible for  the  neglect  and  the  weakness  of 
the  Church.  It  is  plainly  a  situation  which 
the  Church,  itself,  must  meet. 

46 


THE  ATTITUDE  OF  THE  CHURCH 

It  is  too  late  in  the  day  to  say  that  the 
Church  has  nothing  to  do  with  social  reform. 
Conservative  men  may  bewail  the  evil  days 
upon  which  we  have  fallen,  and  deplore  the 
fact  that  the  Church  can  no  longer  take 
refuge  in  the  seclusiveness  of  the  cloister, 
or  in  the  single  purpose  of  preaching  the 
"  simple  gospel."  That  day  will  never  re- 
turn. Such  methods  may  have  sufficed  in  a 
period  when  the  world  was  satisfied  to 
accept  the  ecclesiasticism  of  the  mediaeval 
period,  or  the  type  of  evangelism  which 
leaves  out  of  account  vast  areas  of  human 
experience.  The  true  gospel  of  Jesus  Christ 
is  as  wide  as  human  need,  and  as  deep  as 
the  human  heart  can  feel.  Any  other  kind 
of  a  gospel  is  an  insult  to  him  who  gave  it 
to  us,  and  a  slander  upon  his  Christianity. 

A  re-reading  of  the  splendid  platform 
adopted  by  the  Federal  Council  will  con- 
vince any  one  that  that  body  committed  itself 
pretty  thoroughly  to  the  social  programme. 

47 


THE  CHURCH  AND  LABOR 

There  is  no  getting  away  from  the  fact 
that  the  churches  here  represented  pledged 
themselves  to  the  securing  of  social  justice. 
It  seems  like  a  truism  to  say  that  the  Church 
believes  in  bringing  in  a  reign  of  righteous- 
ness. If  it  is  n't  here  for  that  purpose,  it  has 
no  business  to  be  here  at  all.  But  read  again 
those  resolutions,  and  then  try  to  indicate 
how  the  Church,  as  an  organization,  is  ac- 
tually and  definitely  trying  to  usher  in  the 
conditions  called  for.  Take  such  a  matter 
as  "  the  abolition  of  child  labor."  Where 
are  the  representatives  of  the  Church  when 
committees  are  appearing  before  the  legis- 
latures to  plead  for  the  enactment  of  a  law 
which  will  make  it  a  reality?  The  labor 
union  is  there.  The  social  settlement  will 
have  its  representative.  The  woman's  club 
may  send  its  delegates.  But  the  Church  is 
rarely,  if  ever,  present  in  the  persons  of  its 
members.  And  why  should  it  not  be  there  ? 
Is  it  any  more  unholy  to  be  engaged  in  this 

48 


THE  ATTITUDE  OF  THE  CHURCH 

business  than  it  is  to  be  doing  any  one  of  a 
dozen  other  things  which  are  regarded  as 
legitimate  church  work,  as,  for  instance,  to 
spend  an  afternoon  with  the  Ladies'  Aid 
Society,  sewing  garments  for  the  poor,  or 
in  teaching  a  class  in  the  industrial  school? 
Is  n't  it  perfectly  legitimate  to  save  the  lives 
of  little  children  as  well  as  their  souls  f  Jesus 
surely  meant  that  brightness  and  cheer  in 
this  life  should  come  to  those  of  whom  he 
said:  "  Suffer  little  children  to  come  unto 
me,  for  of  such  is  the  kingdom  of  heaven." 
Why  cannot  the  Church  send  its  committee 
to  the  legislature  to  make  the  plea  that  Jesus 
would  make,  were  he  here  ? 

Again,  the  Federal  Council  declared  that 
it  would  "  advocate  the  cause  of  working- 
men  when  their  cause  is  just."  Has  anybody 
heard  of  any  denomination,  or  any  conspicu- 
ous church  organization,  since  this  resolu- 
tion was  passed,  becoming  the  advocate  of 
any  body  of  workingmen  who  were  making 

49 


THE  CHURCH  AND  LABOR 

a  fight  for  a  living  wage  or  decent  sanitary 
conditions?  It  would  be  a  fine  thing  if  we 
could  point  to  such  an  instance  as  an  illustra- 
tion of  what  the  Church  is  doing  in  behalf 
of  workingmen.  But  the  churches  are  silent 
on  these  questions.  They  dare  not,  or  they 
will  not,  speak.  There  surely  have  been 
enough  instances  in  which  the  Church 
would  have  been  justified  in  protesting,  but 
the  Church  has  passed  by  on  the  other  side 
and  allowed  the  despised  Samaritan  —  the 
labor  leader  or  the  man  outside  the  Church 
—  to  step  in  and  usurp  the  place  which 
rightfully  belongs  to  it. 

The  Brotherhoods  connected  with  the 
various  denominations  of  America  are 
vainly  searching  for  a  great  task,  —  some- 
thing which  will  call  out  the  heroic  and  the 
sublime  in  men.  Here's  the  job — it's  a 
man's  job,  too.  No  one  else  can  do  it.  But 
do  the  men  of  the  churches  really  want 
to  get  into  the  serious  business  of  life-sav- 

50 


THE  ATTITUDE  OF  THE  CHURCH 

ing?    Aren't  they  rather  more  content  to 
sit  around  and  talk  and  sing  about  it? 

The  Church  has  always  been  ready  to 
offer  comfort  in  times  of  distress  and  illness. 
It  has  always  engaged  in  a  magnificent  phil- 
anthropy of  which  it  may  well  be  proud. 
It  has  visited  the  sick  and  fed  the  hungry. 
But  it  has  not  loved  its  neighbor  as  it  loved 
itself.  It  is  not  going  to  the  root  of  social 
suffering,  and  attempting  to  cut  it  out.  It  is 
not  sufficient  to  say  that  if  all  the  working- 
men  would  become  converted,  all  the  social 
ills  of  the  world  would  be  healed.  The 
workingmen  are  guilty,  in  large  measure, 
but  they  are  not  the  only  guilty  ones.  If  the 
Church  were  one  half  as  strenuous  in  its 
attempts  to  reach  the  "  classes  "  as  it  is  to 
reach  the  "  masses,"  the  social  problem 
would  be  got  at.  It  is  only  fair  that  the  sin- 
ner at  the  top  should  be  given  as  much  at- 
tention as  the  sinner  at  the  bottom.  It  may 
be  said  that  the  rich  are  being  preached  to 

SI 


THE   CHURCH  AND  LABOR 

every  Sabbath  day,  but  they  are  not  appealed 
to  so  directl}^  and  so  specifically  as  are  the 
poor.  We  take  it  upon  ourselves  to  say 
many  things  to  the  workingman  that  we  do 
not  dare  say  to  his  employer,  because  the 
workingman  is  helpless  and  he  does  n't  own 
the  pews  in  our  churches. 

Many  a  church  is  getting  a  great  deal  of 
comfort  out  of  the  fact  that  it  is  conducting 
a  mission  for  workingmen,  which,  in  most 
cases,  is  situated  on  a  side  street,  in  a  dark, 
dingy,  dirty  building,  and  is  managed  by  a 
man  to  whom  the  Church  is  paying  a  piti- 
fully small  salary,  usually  because  he  is  a 
student  or  a  worn-out  preacher.  But  this 
sort  of  a  mission  will  never  attract  working- 
men.  It  will  not  even  attract  those  appar- 
ently miserable  foreigners  in  the  neighbor- 
hood, because  they  have  been  accustomed 
to  worship  in  the  most  beautiful  cathedrals 
in  Europe.  We  cannot  give  them  the  mag- 
nificent  buildings  with   which  they    have 

52 


THE  ATTITUDE  OF  THE  CHURCH 

been  familiar,  but  we  can  at  least  give  them 
clean,  cheerful  halls  or  churches.  Further- 
more, in  the  average  mission,  there  is  n't  the 
slightest  trace  of  the  spirit  of  democracy 
which  the  workingman  meets  in  almost 
every  other  relationship  in  life,  —  in  labor 
union,  lodge,  club,  saloon.  The  enterprise 
seems  to  ignore  all  the  laws  of  ps3^chology, 
to  say  nothing  about  the  spirit  of  democracy. 
The  leaders  of  our  religious  institutions 
seem  to  have  lost  sight  of  a  fact  that  they 
have  long  since  learned  in  business  life, 
namel}^,  that  there  is  nothing  that  a  working- 
man  despises  more  heartily  than  a  spirit  of 
patronage  or  paternalism. 

Frequently,  a  church  will  imagine  that 
the  introduction  of  institutional  features  will 
save  the  day,  and  forthwith  an  elaborate 
organization  is  perfected  which  it  is  hoped 
will  capture  the  community.  But  institu- 
tional work,  while  very  useful  and  very 
commendable,  is  by  no  means  a  sohent  of 

53 


THE  CHURCH  AND  LABOR 

the  social  question,  nor  does  the  working- 
man  always  respond  to  such  an  appeal.  The 
great  misfortune  is  that  the  average  church 
looks  upon  these  features  as  merely  a  means 
to  an  end,  —  which  end,  by  the  way,  is  sim- 
ply the  enlargement  of  the  church  roll. 
Such  an  attitude  is  altogether  wrong,  and 
contrary  to  the  spirit  of  Jesus,  who  healed 
the  sick,  not  that  they  might  come  to  hear 
him  preach,  but  because  he  had  compas- 
sion upon  them,  and  because  they  needed 
healing. 

The  Church  should  engage  in  social 
work  in  behalf  of  the  people,  but  it  should 
do  this  work  even  though  it  does  not  result 
in  a  single  accession  to  the  church  which 
is  doing  it.  The  fact  of  the  matter  is,  that 
in  many  cases  the  people  who  have  been 
helped  will  unite  with  some  other  church 
where  their  former  poverty  is  unknown.  It 
is  also  true  that  the  general  impression  made 
upon  the  community  always  results  in  a 

54 


THE  ATTITUDE  OF  THE  CHURCH 

softening  of  the  feeling  toward  the  church 
that  is  doing  an  unselfish  work,  even  among 
those  who  themselves  are  not  the  direct 
recipients  of  the  favor  of  the  church.  Thus 
the  Kingdom  has  been  extended,  and  this 
is  worth  while.  Incidentally,  those  who 
have  been  influenced  in  other  fields  will 
come  to  the  church  which  seems  to  be  get- 
ting no  direct  results  from  its  social  work. 
In  this  way  there  is  frequently  an  exchange 
of  courtesies  between  the  churches. 

One  of  the  principal  reasons  why  the 
Church  seems  not  to  understand  the  social 
and  the  industrial  problem  is  the  fact  that 
the  ministry  is  recruited  almost  entirely 
from  the  farming,  the  commercial,  and  the 
professional  classes.  Very  few  working- 
men,  fresh  from  the  ranks  of  the  toilers  in 
the  shop,  the  mill,  the  mine,  and  the  factor}', 
go  into  the  ministry.  It  often  happens  that 
a  workingman's  son  will  study  in  the  theo- 
logical school,  but  it  is  rarely  true  that  he 

55 


THE  CHURCH  AND  LABOR 

carries  with  him  the  workingman's  spirit, 
largely  because  he  has  really  never  known 
it.  He  has  never  experienced  the  real  trials 
of  an  artisan  or  laboring  man.  He  may  even 
have  worked  with  the  laboring  man  dur- 
ing his  boyhood  days  and  seen  much  of  the 
life  of  his  class,  but  in  most  instances  he 
will  have  seen  only  the  petty  commonplace 
things,  which  often  make  one  impatient  with 
the  workingman,  or  which,  perhaps,  make 
one  sympathetic  only  in  the  smaller  affairs  of 
life.  But  the  great  pressing  problems  of  arti- 
san manhood  he  has  never  known.  The  re- 
sponsibilities of  the  care  of  a  workingman's 
family  he  knows  nothing  about.  And  all  too 
frequently,  if  he  has  known  these  things, 
the  training  and  the  atmosphere  of  the 
school  and  the  seminary  have  almost  com- 
pletely obliterated  them  from  his  heart  and 
mind.  The  system  of  education  in  practi- 
cally all  of  our  schools  is  not  calculated  to 
increase  one's  sympathy  for  or  interest  in 

56 


THE  ATTITUDE  OF  THE  CHURCH 

the  artisan  class,  except  in  an  academic 
way.  The  workingman  is  considered  a 
good  subject  for  sociological  investigation, 
and  his  home  is  ruthlessly  invaded  by  fad- 
dists bent  on  securing  alleged  facts  for 
fool  speeches,  or  students  who  are  seeking 
information  for  the  preparation  of  theses 
which  shall  earn  them  their  degrees  of 
Ph.  D. 

The  theological  seminaries  do  not  pre- 
pare men  to  meet  the  situation  adequately. 
Their  courses  of  study  are  antiquated,  and 
their  professors  as  a  class  know  nothing, 
and  seem  to  care  less,  about  the  questions 
that  trouble  the  masses.  They  take  refuge 
behind  the  worn-out  excuse  that  the  simple 
gospel  will  solve  all  these  problems,  with- 
out knowing  what  the  problems  are. 

As  most  of  the  graduates  of  the  seminary 
are  country-bred  men,  they  have  no  con- 
ception as  to  the  difficulties  and  the  heart- 
breakins  situations  which  so  often  confront 

S7 


THE  CHURCH  AND  LABOR 

the  city  workingman.  They  know  nothing 
about  the  great  undercurrents  which  are 
influencing  the  masses.  They  are  entirely 
ignorant  of  the  aims  and  objects  of  the  labor 
movement,  as  expressed  either  in  the  trades- 
union  or  in  sociaHsm.  To  them  these  move- 
ments are  simply  breeders  of  a  social  unrest, 
and  they  have  come  to  have  the  notion  that 
it  is  their  business  to  put  down  social  unrest, 
forgetting  that  it  is  really  the  business  of  the 
Church  to  create  social  unrest. 

There  are  no  labor  troubles  in  Darkest 
Africa,  but  the  dynamics  of  the  gospel  will 
soon  create  them.  The  Christian  mission- 
aries have  found  a  continent  of  people  sat- 
isfied with  low  physical,  mental,  and  moral 
ideals.  It  is  the  object  of  the  missionaries 
to  create  among  the  heathen  a  healthy  dis- 
satisfaction with  these  conditions,  by  show- 
ing them  the  possibilities  of  the  Christian 
life.  When  this  awakening  comes,  it  will 
have  no  rest  until  it  breaks  the  bands  which 

58 


THE  ATTITUDE  OF  THE  CHURCH 

bound  them  through  many  a  century.  It  has 
always  been  so  with  the  Church.  But  hav- 
ing aroused  this  spirit  of  social  unrest  in  the 
world,  is  the  Church  to  step  aside  and  per- 
mit the  unscrupulous  agitator  to  come  in, 
taking  for  himself  the  place  of  leadership 
which  the  Church  has  created  for  itself,  or 
will  the  Church  retain  the  position  which 
belongs  to  it,  by  virtue  of  its  work  and  its 
history  ? 

The  greatest  question  before  the  Church 
to-day  with  reference  to  its  attitude  toward 
labor  is  whether  or  not  it  is  willing  to  lead 
the  people  in  their  fight  for  democracy, — 
to  lead  them  unselfishly  and  with  a  fine  de- 
votion to  its  own  highest  ideals. 


Ill 


THE  ETHICAL  VALUE  OF  THE  LABOR 
MOVEMENT 

A  STUDY  of  the  reform  movements  during 
the  past  century  will  reveal  the  fact  that 
workingmen  have  had  more  to  do  with  their 
inauguration  than  any  other  class. 

Mr.  Gladstone  said,  shortly  before  he 
passed  away  :  "  I  painfully  reflect  that  in 
almost  every  great  political  controversy  of 
the  last  fifty  years,  the  leisured  classes,  the 
educated  classes,  the  wealthy  classes,  the 
titled  classes,  have  been  in  the  wrong."  The 
common  people, — the  toilers,  the  men  of 
uncommon  sense, — these  have  been  re- 
sponsible for  nearly  all  of  the  social  reform 
measures  which  the  world  to-day  accepts. 
And  whenever  organized  labor  has  had  an 
opportunity  to  do  so,  it  has  expressed  itself 

60 


ETHICAL  VALUE  OF  LABOR  MOVEMENT 

very  emphatically  with  regard  to  these 
questions,  in  most  cases,  long  before  any 
other  organized  body  of  men  cared  to  com- 
mit themselves  to  them. 

The  labor  movement  is  a  world  move- 
ment. Cordial  relationships  are  sustained 
between  the  various  national  and  interna- 
tional organizations.  They  are  discussing 
the  same  problems.  They  are  fighting  the 
same  conditions.  They  are  seeking  to  in- 
augurate practically  the  same  remedies. 
While  the  ruling  classes  have  been  at  war 
with  one  another,  the  working  classes  have 
been  conferring  as  to  how  they  might  raise 
the  standard  of  living  for  all  mankind.  The 
circular  calling  together  the  first  great  Coal 
Miners'  Convention  said :  "  Let  there  be  no 
English,  no  Irish,  no  Germans,  Scotch  or 
Welsh,  for  we  are  brethren." 

It  was  the  labor  organizations  that  took 
the  first  step  toward  forgetting  the  hatreds 
of  the  Civil  War.     In  1885  the  veterans  of 

61 


THE  CHURCH  AND  LABOR 

both  the  Union  and  the  Confederate  armies, 
who  were  members  of  the  Knights  of  Labor, 
formed  an  orsranization  called  the  Grav  and 
the  Blue.  Their  motto  was  a  most  impress- 
ive one  :  "  Capital  divided,  labor  unites  us." 
Every  man  who  becomes  a  member  of 
the  American  Federation  of  Labor  accepts 
the  following:  — 

We  are  pledged  to  the  emancipation  of  our  class 
from  poverty,  ignorance,  and  selfishness ;  to  be  re- 
spectful in  word  and  action  to  every  w^oman ;  to  be 
considerate  to  the  widow  and  the  orphan,  the  weak 
and  the  defenseless  ;  and  never  to  discriminate  against 
a  fellow  worker  on  account  of  creed,  color,  or  nation- 
ality ;  to  defend  freedom  of  thought,  whether  ex- 
pressed by  tongue  or  pen ;  to  educate  ourselves  and 
our  fellow  workers  in  the  history  of  the  labor  move- 
ment. We  promise  that  we  will  never  knowingly 
wrong  a  brother  or  see  him  wronged,  if  in  our  power 
to  prevent  it.  We  will  endeavor  to  subordinate  every 
selfish  impulse  to  the  task  of  elevating  the  material, 
intellectual,  and  moral  conditions  of  the  entire  labor- 
ing class. 

62 


ETHICAL  VALUE  OF  LABOR  MOVEMENT 

On  the  color  question  the  trades-union 
has  alwa3'S  been  far  in  advance  of  any  other 
organization.  Even  in  the  South,  where  race 
hatred  is  so  prevalent,  the  negroes  have  been 
admitted  into  the  trades-unions,  while  they 
have  been  barred  from  other  organizations 
that  are  antagonistic  to  organized  labor.  The 
color  barriers  have  been  broken  down  by 
labor  unions,  and  not  his  color  but  his  char- 
acter bars  the  negro,  when  he  is  rejected. 
It  is  quite  true  that  individual  labor  unions 
have  sometimes  sinned  in  this  respect,  but 
wherever  the  sentiment  of  organized  work- 
ino^men  has  been  manifested  a^rainst  the 
negro,  it  will  be  found  that  this  same  spirit 
has  been  prevalent  to  even  a  greater  extent 
in  the  churches  and  in  civic  and  commercial 


organizations. 


In  1846,  when  the  churches  were,  as  the 
abolitionists  said,  the  "bulwarks  of  Ameri- 
can slavery,"  when  Garrison  and  Thompson 
and  Pillsbury  were  being  mobbed  by  college 

63 


THE  CHURCH  AND  LABOR 

students,  and  when  the  slaveholders  were 
masters  of  Congress  and  the  courts  of  law, 
a  labor  convention  at  Lynn  passed  this  cour- 
ageous resolution:  "We  wish  to  secure  to 
our  three  million  brethren  and  sisters  groan- 
ing in  chains  on  the  southern  plantations  the 
same  rights  and  privileges  for  which  we  are 
contending." 

It  was  among  the  labor  guilds  of  the  apo- 
stolic days  that  the  gospel  had  its  freest 
course.  So  true  is  this  that  in  a  volume  en- 
titled "  Ancient  Lowly,"  the  author  declares 
that  Christianity  was  simply  a  movement  of 
organized  labor.  To  quote  from  this  most 
interesting  volume :  — 

We  must  introduce  here  the  quite  singular  but 
perfectly  natural  fact  that  wherever  the  unions  were 
thoroughly  established  and,  so  to  speak,  nested  to- 
gether, the  Christian  church  was  sure  to  first  plant 
itself.  Thus  Pergamos,  the  seat  of  the  great  uprising 
of  workingmen  under  Aristonicus  in  b.  c.  133-129, 
became  the  mellow  ground  wherein  the  early  Chris- 

64 


ETHICAL  VALUE  OF  LABOR  MOVEMENT 

tians  planted,  and  on  which  they  reared  one  of  their 
most  celebrated  churches.  .  .  .  Cappadocia,  which 
did  not  fall  into  Roman  hands  until  a.  d.  17,  was  also 
one  of  the  early  posts  of  the  Christians.  The  first 
epistle  of  St.  Peter  bears  this  name.  Here,  too,  the 
labor  brotherhoods  had  a  strong  foothold.  This  is 
rendered  certain  by  the  recent  discovery  of  several  of 
their  slabs  and  monuments  bearing  inscriptions.  Lao- 
dicea  was  also  a  stronghold  of  both  the  unions  and 
the  early  Christians.  This  place,  together  with  Ephe- 
sus  and  Hieropolis,  is  where  were  founded  the  seven 
Apocalyptic  churches.  The  early  church  found  mel- 
low souls  among  the  brotherhoods  of  the  eranoi  and 
thiasoi. 

Apamea,  near  Antioch,  the  birthplace  of  Eunus, 
instigator  of  the  greatest  of  all  the  slave  uprisings, 
was  also  the  cradle  of  one  of  the  early  churches.  We 
have,  in  our  account  of  this  great  strike,  shown  that 
Eunus  and  his  men  seemed  both  to  be  deeply  imbued 
with  the  everywhere  present  idea  of  the  Messiah, 
who  was  to  redeem  the  world,  and  also  thoroughly 
acquainted  with  the  methods  of  secret  organization. 
His  knowledge  of  the  auspices  and  plan  of  organiz- 
ation were  really  at  the  base  of  his  success.  These 
things,  added  to  inscriptions  found  in  the  vicinity  of 

65 


THE  CHURCH  AND  LABOR 

labor  unions  of  an  antiquity  coeval  with  this  great 
servile  war,  show  very  plainly  why  Christianity  took 
root  so  readily  in  those  regions  of  Asia. 

The  labor  movement  has  become  to  thou- 
sands of  workingmen  a  substitute  for  the 
Church.  Socialism  means  more  than  an 
economic  system  to  many  who  have  em- 
braced it.  It  has  become  to  them  a  religion. 
The  ethical  value  of  the  trades-union  is 
rarely  appreciated.  The  average  outsider 
regards  it  as  a  militant  organization,  which 
has  brought  into  combination  large  numbers 
of  workingmen  for  the  sole  purpose  of  se- 
curing better  wages  and  shorter  hours.  It 
is  quite  true  that  this  is  an  important  part 
of  the  trades-union's  function,  but  its  efforts 
are  by  no  means  confined  to  this  limited 
operation.  In  many  American  and  Euro- 
pean cities  the  trades-unions  have  erected 
labor  temples,  which  are  devoted  to  the 
exclusive  use  of  trades-unionists  and  their 
families.  These  buildings  have  become  im- 

66 


ETHICAL  VALUE  OF  LABOR  MOVEMENT 

portant  social  centres.  The  various  locals  in 
the  city  hold  their  meetings  in  halls  which 
are  set  apart  for  this  purpose,  and  here  the 
"walking  delegates"  or  business  agents 
have  their  offices,  to  which  the  unemployed 
workingman  comes  in  order  to  secure  em- 
ployment, for  it  is  part  of  the  business 
agent's  function  to  find  work  for  the  mem- 
bers of  his  organization. 

Frequently,  helpful  lecture  courses  are 
given.  And  there  is  a  moral  value  in  the 
regular  meetings  of  the  union  which  is  not 
to  be  despised.  The  discipline  of  the  aver- 
age labor  union  meeting  is  of  great  value 
to  the  inexperienced  laborer.  He  comes 
into  contact  with  forces  which  drill  him 
mentally  and  morally  to  such  a  degree  that 
his  ethical  standards  are  bound  to  be  ad- 
vanced. He  soon  comes  to  realize  that  he 
cannot  force  a  particular  measure  upon  his 
associates.  He  must  possess  the  facts,  and 
he  must  know  how  to  present  them,  in  order 

67 


THE  CHURCH  AND  LABOR 

to  have  his  way.  For  these  workingmen 
think  independently  in  their  labor  halls. 
They  do  not  blindly  follow  their  leaders, 
as  is  generally  supposed.  The  office  of  the 
"walking  delegate"  is  by  no  means  the 
sinecure  which  most  people  imagine  it  is. 
Every  man  has  a  fair  chance  to  present  his 
views,  no  matter  how  unpopular  he  or  they 
may  be.  He  learns  the  lesson  of  subordin- 
ation to  the  will  of  others,  which  is  always 
a  good  discipline.  Incidentally,  and  almost 
unconsciously,  the  value  of  brotherhood, 
of  cooperation,  of  team  work,  are  impressed 
upon  him.  The  sacrifices  that  he  makes  in 
behalf  of  others  have  a  salutary  effect. 

If  the  trades-union  is  a  militant  organiza- 
tion,—  and  it  is,  —  it  also  has  its  value  in 
times  of  peace.  Very  little  is  known  about 
the  immense  sums  of  money  which  are  ex- 
pended in  caring  for  the  sick,  the  unem- 
ployed, the  widows,  and  the  orphans.  The 
International   Typographical    Union    sup- 

68 


ETHICAL  VALUE  OF  LABOR  MOVEMENT 

ports  in  Colorado  a  million-dollar  home 
for  the  use  of  its  members  who  are  suffer- 
ing from  tuberculosis,  or  who  have  be- 
come incapacitated  on  account  of  old  age 
or  illness.  The  Cigarmakers'  Union,  with 
a  membership  of  forty-five  thousand,  dis- 
bursed during  the  past  twenty-eight  years 
over  eight  million  dollars  in  sick  and  other 
benefits.  The  International  Association  of 
Machinists  is  typical  of  a  large  number  of 
other  trades-unions  in  the  matter  of  sick  and 
death  benefits.  Members  who  are  out  of 
work  on  account  of  a  grievance,  approved 
by  the  General  Executive  Board,  and  who 
have  been  three  months  in  continuous  good 
standing,  receive  six  dollars  per  week. 
Married  men,  and  single  men  with  others 
dependent  upon  them  for  support,  receive 
eight  dollars  per  week,  and  apprentices  re- 
ceive one  half  of  this  rate.  Members  who  are 
unemployed  because  of  their  faithfulness  to 
the  trades-union  receive  the  same  amount 

69 


THE  CHURCH  AND  LABOR 

of  money  as  though  they  were  out  on  strike. 
A  member,  having  attained  the  age  of  sixty- 
five  years,  who  has  been  ten  consecutive 
years  in  good  standing,  is  entitled  to  $500, 
and  at  sixty-eight  years  of  age,  with  twenty 
years  to  his  credit,  he  receives  the  sum  of 
$1000. 

Death  benefits  are  as  follows :  Six  months' 
continuous  good  standing,  $50;  one  year, 
$75  5  t^^  years,  $100;  three  years,  $150; 
four  years,  $200.  A  trades-unionist  rarely, 
if  ever,  applies  to  a  charity  organization 
society  for  relief. 

Carroll  D.  Wright  said,  in  one  of  his 
reports  to  the  United  States  Congress,  that 
the  trades-union  is  performing  an  invaluable 
service  in  Americanizing  the  immigrant, 
and  he  adds:  — 

The  records  of  this  of^ce  show  that  during  an  in- 
vestigation of  building  and  loan  associations  a  few 
years  ago,  information  from  the  Bohemians,  the 
Polish,  and  other  clannish  associations  of  that  char- 

70 


ETHICAL  VALUE  OF  LABOR  MOVEMENT 

acter  could  be  obtained  only  through  the  services  of 
an  interpreter.  It  was  found  that  as  soon  as  a  Bohe- 
mian or  a  Pole  heard  the  word  '^  government,"  or 
"  government  agent,"  he  closed  his  mouth  and  it  was 
impossible  to  secure  any  information. 

This  has  been  true  in  other  investigations,  notably 
in  collecting  family  budgets ;  but  with  an  intelligent 
interpreter,  using  their  own  language,  the  nature  of 
the  work  was  explained,  and  no  further  difficulty 
experienced.  The  union  is  breaking  down  this  trait 
of  character  in  the  foreigners  of  the  nationalities 
mentioned.  This  it  is  doing,  not  as  a  matter  of  phil- 
anthropy, but  from  a  selfish  necessity.  The  immigrant 
must  be  taught  that  he  must  stand  straight  up  on  his 
own  feet ;  that  the  ward  politician  is  dependent  on 
him,  — on  his  vote,  etc.,  —  and  not  he  on  the  ward 
politician.  In  this  way  he  first  learns  that  he  is  a 
part  of  the  government ;  and  while  this  is  done  by 
indirection,  in  a  large  sense,  there  is  no  other  force 
that  is  doing  it  at  all.  The  Pole,  the  Bohemian,  the 
Lithuanian,  the  Slovak,  and  to  a  much  lesser  degree 
the  Galician,  have  inherited  the  feeling  that  somehow 
government  is  a  thing  inimical  to  their  natural  de- 
velopment, —  a  power  forcing  itself  upon  them  from 
afar;  an  intrusive  power  for   repression,  taxation, 


THE  CHURCH  AND  LABOR 

punishment  only ;  a  thing  which  they  must  stand  in 
awe  of,  obey,  pay  tribute  to,  and  wish  that  it  had  not 
come  among  their  people,  even  if  they  did  not  secretly 
hate  it,  —  a  thing,  in  short,  which  ought  not  to  be. 
Being  weaker  than  it,  they  must  be  silent  in  its  pre- 
sence ;  and  if  forced  to  speak,  lie,  as  for  them  to  tell 
the  truth  would  mean  imprisonment  or  death.  .  .  . 
It  is  doubtful  if  any  organization  other  than  a 
trades-union  could  accomplish  these  things,  for  only 
the  bread  and  butter  necessity  would  be  potent  enough 
as  an  influence  to  bring  these  people  out  of  the  fixed 
forms  and  crystallizations  of  life  into  which  they  have 
been  compressed.  Certain  it  is  that  no  other  organ- 
ization is  attempting  to  do  this  work,  at  least  not  by 
amalgamation,  which  is  the  only  way  assimilation 
can  be  secured  among  the  various  foreign  elements. 
The  drawing  of  these  people  away  from  their  petty 
clique  leaders  and  getting  them  to  think  for  them- 
selves upon  one  line  of  topics,  namely,  the  industrial 
conditions  and  the  importance  of  trade  organization, 
result  in  a  mental  uplift.  The  only  way  they  can  pull 
a  Slovak  away  from  his  leader  is  to  pull  him  up  until 
he  has  gotten  above  his  leader  along  the  lines  of 
thought  they  are  working  on.  The  very  essence  of 
the  trade  argument  on  the  immigrant  is  —  uncon- 

72 


ETHICAL  VALUE  OF  LABOR  MOVEMENT 

sciously  again  —  an  uplifting  and  an  Americanizing 
influence.  The  unionist  begins  to  talk  better  wages, 
better  working  conditions,  better  opportunities,  better 
homes,  better  clothes.  Now,  one  cannot  eternally 
argue  ''better"  in  the  ears  of  any  man,  no  matter 
how  restricted  the  particular  ''better"  harped  on, 
without  producing  something  of  a  psychological  at- 
mosphere of  "better'*  in  all  his  thought  and  live 
activities.  If  better  food,  better  wages,  or  even  better 
beer,  is  the  only  kind  of  "better"  one  might  get  a 
Slovak  or  a  Lithuanian  to  think  about,  then  the  only 
way  to  improve  him  is  to  inject  the  thought  of 
"better"  into  the  only  crevice  to  be  found  in  his 
stupidity. 

The  immigrant  comes  to  our  country  with 
a  false  conception  as  to  our  American  insti- 
tutions. To  him  the  word  government 
means  oppression,  because  that  is  what  it 
meant  to  him  in  the  old  country.  lie  soon 
understands  that  here  it  means  friend. 
Cominsr  to  America  with  a  stronor  clannish 
instinct,  it  is  very  difficult  for  him  to  asso- 
ciate with  his  fellow  workers;  but  in  the  la- 

73 


THE  CHURCH  AND  LABOR 

bor  union,  he  gets  away  from  his  clannish- 
ness, — something  which  even  his  religion 
is  not  always  able  to  accomplish  for  him. 
And  the  labor  press  reaches  men  of  various 
nationalities.  In  some  instances,  a  single 
paper  will  be  printed  in  two  or  three  lan- 
guages. The  constitution  of  the  United  Mine 
Workers  of  America  is  translated  into  nine 
different  languages.  It  frequently  requires 
four  or  five  different  interpreters  at  a  single 
meeting  to  obligate  the  candidates  for  ad- 
mission into  the  trades-union. 

The  labor  press  has  an  ethical  value. 
There  are  something  like  two  hundred  and 
fifty  weekly  journals  and  about  one  hundred 
monthly  periodicals.  The  monthlies  as  a 
rule  are  the  organs  of  international  organiz- 
ations, while  the  weeklies  represent  the 
central  labor  unions,  which  are  comprised 
of  the  locals  in  a  particular  city.  While  the 
editors  of  these  journals  are  usually  elected 
by  the   central    labor    unions,    or    by    the 

74 


ETHICAL  VALUE  OF  LABOR  MOVEMENT 

national  organizations,  they  are  given  the 
largest  liberty  in  the  selection  of  the  mate- 
rial which  is  printed. 

Many  of  these  papers  have  a  fine  literary 
value,  and  equal,  in  importance,  some  of  the 
better  magazines.  They  are  certainly  su- 
perior to  most  church  papers,  both  as  to 
the  reading  matter  and  in  their  general  typo- 
graphical appearance.  It  is  not  uncommon 
for  a  labor  paper  to  regularly  print  the  Sun- 
day-School lesson  for  the  following  Sunday. 
Practically  every  labor  paper  contains  at 
various  times  sermons  preached  by  the  lo- 
cal ministers.  For  four  years,  the  labor  press 
of  America  has  regularly  been  printing  an 
article  sent  out  by  one  of  the  departments 
of  Church  and  Labor  in  this  country.  The 
editors  frankly  call  them  sermons.  And  it 
has  been  noted  that  the  articles  which  con- 
tain the  greatest  amount  of  religious  matter 
are  given  the  biggest  headlines.  The  writer 
of  these  articles,  who  is  a  minister,  invari- 

75 


THE  CHURCH  AND  LABOR 

ably  attaches  the  title  "  Rev."  to  his  name, 
largely  because  when  the  articles  were  first 
sent  out  without  this  designation,  the  editors 
themselves  printed  the  title.  These  labor 
journals  usually  have  high  moral  standards, 
and  nearly  every  article  printed  has  a  ten- 
dency to  raise  the  ideals  of  its  readers. 

Organized  labor  is  a  strong  force  for  more 
temperate  living  among  workingmen.  A 
temperance  association,  composed  exclus- 
ively of  "  walking  delegates  "  and  trades- 
union  officials,  is  an  actuality  in  England, 
a  country  which  is  more  generally  given 
over  to  strong  drink  than  is  our  own.  The 
official  title  of  this  remarkable  society  is 
"The  Trades-Union  and  Labor  Officials' 
Temperance  Fellowship,"  and  its  object  is 
"  the  personal  practice  and  promotion  of 
total  abstinence,  and  the  removal  of  trades' 
society  meetings  from  licensed  premises." 
The  president  of  the  Fellowship  is  Arthur 
Henderson,  M.  P.,  who  is  also  chairman  of 

76 


ETHICAL  VALUE  OF  LABOR  MOVEMENT 

the  Labor  Party  in  Parliament.  Among  the 
members  of  the  executive  committee  are 
the  Rt.  Hon.  Thomas  Burt,  M.  P.,  a  mem- 
ber of  the  Privy  Council ;  the  Rt.  Hon.  John 
Burns,  M.  P.,  a  member  of  the  Cabinet; 
Will  Steadman,  M.  P.,  secretary  of  the 
British  Trades-Union  Congress;  J.  Ramsay 
MacDonald,  M.  P.,  secretary  of  the  Labor 
Party;  D.J.  Shackleton,  M.  P.,  chairman  of 
the  Trades-Union  Congress;  and  Harry 
Gosling,  who  is  a  member  of  the  London 
County  Council.  Prominent  amongthe  vice- 
presidents  are  J.  Keir  Hardie,  M.  P.,  Will 
Crooks,  M.  P.,  L.  C.  C,  Philip  Snowden, 
M.  P.,  and  twenty-six  others,  every  one  of 
whom  is  a  member  of  Parliament,  and  every 
one  a  trades-unionist.  This  means  that 
pretty  nearly  every  trades-unionist  elected 
to  Parliament  is  a  total  abstainer. 

The  Fellowship  had  its  beginnings  in 
Leeds  in  1904,  during  a  session  of  the  Brit- 
ish Trades-Union  Congress.  A  'Hea-party  " 

77 


THE  CHURCH  AND  LABOR 

was  held  by  invitation  of  the  National  Tem- 
perance League,  at  which  two  hundred  and 
sixty  delegates  were  present.  The  sugges- 
tion that  a  total  abstinence  society  be  estab- 
lished in  connection  with  labor  was  made 
at  this  time  by  Mr.  Arthur  Henderson, 
M.  P.,  on  behalf  of  his  colleagues.  During 
the  following  year  many  officials  in  the 
trades-union  movement  manifested  their 
interest  in  the  proposed  society,  with  the 
result  that  at  the  Hanley  meeting  of  the 
Trades  Congress  in  1905,  at  a  gathering  of 
three  hundred  delegates,  the  "  Temperance 
Fellowship "  was  launched.  Every  year 
since  its  organization  the  Fellowship  has 
given  a  tea  at  the  time  of  the  annual  meeting 
of  the  British  Trades  Congress,  and  in  every 
case  fully  half  of  the  delegates  attending 
have  been  present. 

At  the  last  meeting  of  the  congress,  there 
were  present  two  hundred  and  seventy 
delegates,  representative  of  a  body  of  close 

78 


ETHICAL  VALUE  OF  LABOR  MOVEMENT 

upon  one  million  workingmen,  which  com- 
prises about  one  half  of  the  trades-unionists 
in  England.  The  influence  of  this  organiza- 
tion upon  the  rank  and  file  of  the  workers  has 
been  quite  remarkable.  Temperance  senti- 
ment has  been  rapidly  growing  among  the 
younger  men  in  the  labor  movement,  and 
as  the  secretary  of  the  General  Federa- 
tion of  Trades-Unions  told  me,  "  It  is  no 
longer  considered  honorable  or  decent  for 
a  labor  man  to  put  away  three  bottles  of 
porter." 

The  Fellowship  issues  considerable  lit- 
erature, and  sends  out  its  manifestoes 
through  the  various  local  labor  unions  and 
the  labor  press.  When  the  "  National  Free- 
dom Defense  League,"  representing  the 
liquor  interests,  sent  out  a  statement  pur- 
porting to  be  in  the  interest  of  the  workers, 
the  entire  committee  and  all  of  the  vice- 
presidents  got  out  a  counter  petition,  which 
was  given  the  widest  publicity  through  the 

79 


THE  CHURCH  AND  LABOR 

daily  press.  Labor's  statement  was  also 
given  additional  publicity  through  imprints 
issued  by  many  local  and  national  trades- 
unions.  These  publications  effectually  si- 
lenced the  pretended  friends  of  the  work- 


ingman. 


One  of  the  most  effective  methods  of 
work  lies  in  securing  meeting-places  for 
local  trades-unions  which  are  free  from  the 
influence  of  the  saloon.  A  successful  effort 
has  been  made  to  secure  the  use  of  public 
buildings  controlled  by  local  governing 
bodies,  and  in  many  cases  churches  have 
been  opened  for  the  use  of  the  trades-unions. 
A  notable  instance  of  cooperation  in  this 
respect  is  that  of  the  Newcastle-on-Tyne 
Temperance  Institute,  where,  as  a  result 
of  the  facilities  offered,  four  thousand  labor 
union  meetings  have  been  held  in  the  build- 
ing since  it  was  opened  to  them,  with  an 
estimated  attendance  of  over  three  hundred 
and  fifty  thousand  persons,  many  of  whom 

80 


ETHICAL  VALUE  OF  LABOR  MOVEMENT 

were  wives  and  children  paying  the  dues 
of  husbands  and  fathers. 

The  labor  leaders  of  America  have  been 
approached  by  the  writer,  asking  their  opin- 
ions concerning  the  formation  of  a  similar 
organization  in  the  United  States.  About 
one  hundred  international  officers  have  ex- 
pressed themselves  as  being  in  favor  of  such 
an  organization,  and,  no  doubt,  in  a  short 
time  the  organization,  adapted  to  American 
conditions,  will  be  launched.  PresidentGom- 
pers,  of  the  American  Federation  of  Labor, 
has  at  three  annual  conventions  expressed 
himself  very  strongly  on  the  general  ques- 
tion of  freeing  the  labor  unions  from  the 
influence  of  the  saloon.  In  his  last  report. 
President  Gompers  said:  — 

There  is  a  constantly  growing  desire  among  our 
membership  to  hold  their  meetings  in  halls  on  the 
premises  of  which  there  is  no  sale  of  intoxicants. 
There  is,  however,  in  nearly  all  centres  a  dearth  of 
sufficient  halls  suitable  for  meeting-rooms  other  than 

8i 


THE  CHURCH  AND  LABOR 

those  with  saloon  attachments.  In  the  interest  of  so- 
briety and  morality,  I  again  urge  that  this  convention 
strongly  recommend  to  our  affiliated  organizations 
throughout  the  country  that  they  inaugurate  a  move- 
ment which  shall  permit  the  use  of  our  public 
schoolrooms  for  the  evening  meetings  of  our  labor 
organizations. 

In  this  effort  to  secure  such  meeting- 
places,  the  Christian  people  of  America 
should  give  the  organized  workmen  their 
heartiest  support,  for  our  efforts  in  the 
matter  of  temperance  reform  should  not 
be  merely  negative,  but  positive.  It  is  not 
sufficient  simply  to  close  up  the  saloon. 
It  is  necessary  to  find  a  substitute  for  the 
saloon.  This,  the  trade-unionists  are  earn- 
estly trying  to  do. 

Organized  labor  is  making  a  fight  for  the 
child.  The  National  Child  Labor  Commit- 
tee finds  no  heartier  supporters  anywhere 
than  they  do  in  the  ranks  of  the  trades-union 
movement.  In  the  interest  of  the  home  life, 

82 


ETHICAL  VALUE  OF  LABOR  MOVEMENT 

it  is  demanding  equal  pay  to  men  and  women 
for  equal  work,  thus  giving  the  women  a 
square  deal.  There  is  no  part  of  President 
Gompers'  annual  report  which  is  given  a 
more  enthusiastic  reception  than  that  in 
which  he  deals  with  the  question  of  uni- 
versal peace.  For,  after  all,  it  is  the  work- 
ingman  who  suffers  most  during  a  time  of 
international  strife. 

While  the  socialist  movement  has  not 
yet  become  as  practical  as  the  trades-union 
movement,  it,  nevertheless,  has  an  import- 
ant ethical  value  in  the  development  of  work- 
ing people.  Many  of  the  ideals  of  social- 
ism are  based  upon  Christian  principles,  and 
they  are  born  of  a  purpose  to  lift  up  our 
common  humanity. 


IV 

WHY  CHURCH  AND  LABOR  MAY  COOPERATE 

There  maybe  many  points  of  difference 
between  the  Church  and  Labor  as  to  speci- 
fic aims  and  methods,  but  there  are  enough 
points  of  agreement  and  a  sufficient  num- 
ber of  fundamental  principles  for  which 
both  stand,  to  warrant  the  Church  and  La- 
bor in  uniting  for  the  purpose  of  carrying 
out  a  common  programme. 

The  Church  and  Labor  should  be  sym- 
pathetic one  toward  the  other;  first,  because 
of  their  common  mistakes.  Both  organiza- 
tions have  been  controlled  by  men  and 
women  who  were  very  human  and  there- 
fore fallible.  There  are  still  occasions  when 
a  criticism  one  of  the  other  is  justifiable. 
But  this  criticism  should  be  sympathetic, 
because   it  will    no  doubt   be  discovered 

84 


CHURCH  AND  LABOR  MAY  COOPERATE 

that  the  critic  has  been  guilty  of  the  same 
offense. 

Church  and  Labor  may  cooperate,  be- 
cause they  both  believe  very  strongly  in 
the  salvation  of  society,  although  they  may 
not  agree  in  every  particular  as  to  how  this 
salvation  is  to  be  accomplished.  No  one 
can  successfully  deny  that  the  influence  of 
the  Church  has  extended  infinitely  beyond 
the  comparatively  narrow  limits  of  its 
own  institutions  and  organizations.  A  city 
without  a  church  would  present  a  hopeless 
situation.  The  unconscious  influence  of 
Christianity  cannot  be  measured.  The  prin- 
ciples of  the  Church  have  so  permeated 
society  that  the  great  mass  of  men  have 
come  to  accept  them  as  a  matter  of  course. 
But  even  more  significant  is  the  positive 
influence  of  the  Church  upon  society.  How- 
ever ineffective  it  may  be  in  some  respects, 
the  Church  may  well  be  proud  of  its  history 
in  the  matter  of  social  reform.    The  labor 

8; 


THE  CHURCH  AND  LABOR 

movement,  if  it  counts  for  anything  at  all, 
must  be  considered  as  a  social  movement. 
In  a  very  important  sense,  the  individual  is 
absolutely  lost  in  it.  There  is  no  term  that 
is  more  frequently  employed  to  express  the 
significance  of  this  movement  than  "  the 
solidarity  of  the  working  classes." 

Church  and  Labor  may  cooperate  be- 
cause they  both  believe  in  the  emancipation 
of  the  individual.  They  both  demand  that 
a  man  shall  rise  up  and  be  counted  as  one. 
There  was  a  time  when  nothing  was  quite 
so  cheap  as  human  life.  Even  to-day,  many 
large  employers  of  labor  consider  it  cheaper 
to  run  the  risk  of  killing  their  employees 
and  paying  the  slight  indemnity,  than  to  go 
to  the  expense  of  introducing  safety  appli- 
ances. Labor  has  long  been  fighting  for  the 
recognition  of  the  value  of  the  individual 
human  life.  It  has  insisted  that  a  man  is  of 
more  value  than  a  machine.  The  ancient 
philosophers    declared    that    a    purchased 

86 


CHURCH  AND  LABOR  MAY  COOPERATE 

slave  is  better  than  a  hired  one,  and  in  ac- 
cordance with  this  principle  they  compelled 
half  the  world  to  live  behind  prison  bars. 
They  insisted  that  the  workingman  has  no 
soul.  Then  came  Jesus  Christ.  He  showed 
the  world  how  highly  God  values  the  indi- 
vidual. And  the  Church  has  ever  since 
advocated  this  principle. 

Church  and  Labor  may  cooperate  because 
they  both  believe  in  the  care  of  the  human 
body.  It  would  not  be  very  difficult  to  pro- 
duce proof  texts  from  Scripture  in  order  to 
indicate  that  the  Bible  teaches  this  doctrine. 
"Ye  are  the  temples  of  the  Holy  Ghost" 
was  the  statement  of  the  New  Testament 
writer  when  he  argued  for  bodily  cleanli- 
ness. Labor  is  trying  to  secure  higher  wages 
and  shorter  hours,  in  order  that  living  con- 
ditions may  be  improved.  In  such  matters 
as  sanitary  reform  in  tenement  houses  and 
factories,  in  the  securing  of  suitable  social 
and  recreative  centres  for  the  people,  and  in 

87 


THE  CHURCH  AND  LABOR 

every  other  particular  that  influences  the 
physical  conditions  of  the  masses.  Church 
and  Labor  may  present  a  united  front. 

Church  and  Labor  may  cooperate  because 
they  are  both  aiming  at  the  development 
of  the  human  soul.  One  takes  it  for  granted 
that  the  Church  is  interested  in  soul  devel- 
opment. Unfortunately,  the  Church  has 
sometimes  confined  itself  too  strictly  to  this 
phase  of  its  work.  It  must  not  be  assumed, 
however,  that  the  labor  movement  is  simply 
a  bread-and-butter  question.  It  is  more  than 
that,  and  always  has  been.  The  subjects 
discussed  in  the  chapter  on  the  Ethical 
Value  of  the  Labor  Movement  are  indi- 
cative of  the  attitude  of  Labor  toward  the 
moral  questions  confronting  society  to-day. 
The  trades-unions  have  not  only  raised  the 
standard  of  living,  they  have  not  only  bet- 
tered the  morale  of  the  workers,  but  have 
given  them  aspirations  and  ideals  which 
are  influencing  the  soul  life  of  the  people. 

88 


CHURCH  AND  LABOR  MAY  COOPERATE 

Because  the  Church  and  Labor  have  so 
many  important  things  in  common,  it  must 
be  obvious  that  it  would  be  to  the  advan- 
tage of  both  to  get  together  so  that  each  may 
become  more  effective. 

Unfortunately,  the  Church  is  attempting 
to  reach  the  workingman  from  above.  It  has 
failed  to  recognize  the  spirit  of  democracy, 
which  has  been  so  frequently  referred  to 
in  previous  chapters.  It  has  been  trying 
to  "help"  the  workingman.  There  was  a 
time  when  some  men  —  the  so-called  priv- 
ileged classes  —  believed  that  the  rest  of  the 
world  was  created  for  their  special  benefit. 
All  others  were  made  simply  to  serve  them, 
to  make  life  soft  and  easy.  They  could  not 
bear  to  think  of  hardship  or  of  suffering. 
Such  things  were  intended  only  for  the 
"  lower  classes,"  —  those  who  were  so 
related  to  the  beasts  of  the  field,  so  close  to 
the  clods  of  the  earth,  that  all  the  finer  sens- 
ibilities were  absent  from  their  lives.   But 

89 


THE  CHURCH  AND  LABOR 

they  slowly  discovered  that  the  "  clods  " 
were  capable  of  better  things,  so  they  began 
to  "help  "  them  on  to  the  higher  things  of 
life.  Amazing  was  the  degree  to  which  "  the 
man  with  the  hoe  "  could  attain,  when  he 
was  given  half  a  chance.  That  he  could 
hold  his  own  with  the  best  of  those  who 
formerly  regarded  themselves  as  of  superior 
clay,  of  "  bluer  blood,"  of  finer  grain,  was 
a  discovery  which  came  as  a  great  surprise. 
Be  it  said  to  the  credit  of  most  of  them,  they 
welcomed  the  revelation  that  the  common 
people  were  made  of  the  same  material  that 
they  were,  —  that  their  ideals  of  life,  their 
heart  hungers,  their  sorrows  and  their  griefs, 
their  loves  and  their  joys,  were  very  much 
like  their  own.  All  the  more  willing  were 
they  to  give  their  lives  in  service  in  behalf 
of  their  more  unfortunately  situated  neigh- 
bors. 

But  now  we  are  ready  for  another  step  in 
advance.  It  was  a  fine  thing  to  help  the  man 

90 


CHURCH  AND  LABOR  MAY  COOPERATE 

who  was  so  ready  to  help  himself,  or  even 
the  man  who  was  not  ready.  It  was  a  Christ- 
like thing  to  bear  the  burdens  of  those  who 
were  heavy-laden.  There  will  always  be 
such  in  the  world.  Misfortune  and  accident, 
the  lack  of  opportunity  on  account  of  physi- 
cal disability  or  illness,  and  a  good  many 
other  things,  will  always  leave  in  our  midst 
those  who  should  be  given  a  helping  hand. 
However,  the  normal  man,  be  he  rich  or 
poor,  educated  through  books  or  through 
experience ;  be  he  black  or  white,  yellow  or 
red,  no  matter  what  his  circumstances,  — 
so  long  as  he  is  a  man  who  is  doing  a  man's 
work  in  the  world,  is  "  helping  "  every  other 
fellow  in  a  way  which  is  rarely  appreciated. 
The  poorest,  neediest  man  in  the  world,  who 
is  doing  his  best,  is  rendering  a  real  service 
to  the  richest  man  in  the  world.  He  is  mak- 
ing]: a  contribution  to  the  world's  work  which 
mere  wages  do  not  repay.  Even  the  de- 
spised immigrant,  who  does  not  understand 

91 


THE  CHURCH  AND  LABOR 

a  word  of  English,  but  who  is  contributing 
his  share  to  the  common  good  by  shoveling 
dirt  in  a  construction  camp,  is  making  a 
debtor  of  the  man  who  will  later  ride  over 
that  railroad  track  in  his  comfortable  Pull- 
man, made  smooth-running  because  that 
Italian  made  a  good  job  of  his  shoveling. 
But  everywhere  in  human  life,  in  the  low- 
liest places,  in  shop  and  factory,  on  the  street 
and  on  the  road,  everywhere,  men  and 
women,  and  even  little  children,  are  bring- 
ing their  contributions  to  the  great  treasure 
house  to  which  we  all  come  and  freely  draw 
—  some  more,  some  less;  but  he  who  draws 
most  becoming  the  greatest  debtor  to  all 
mankind. 

Here  is  the  point,  then:  Let  us  talk  less 
about  "  helping,"  about  "  service,"  and  let 
us  think  more  about  "exchange";  for  that 
is  what  it  is,  —  the  exchange  of  our  abilities, 
our  contributions.  He  who  teaches  his  bro- 
ther a  great  truth,  himself  learns  another. 

92 


CHURCH  AND  LABOR  MAY  COOPERATE 

This  is  the  spirit  which  the  Church  needs 
to  learn.  We  are  talking  too  much  about  , 
"  sacrifice  "  and  "  devotion  "  in  our  church 
life  and  work,  forgetting  that  there  are  others 
who  are  sacrificing  as  much  as  we  are,  and 
who  are  just  as  devoted.  The  problem  of 
the  Church  and  Labor  is  not  a  question  of 
raising  money.  Money  has  practically  no- 
thing to  do  with  it.  Jesus  never  mentioned  it 
when  he  commissioned  the  disciples.  He 
spoke  of  spirit  and  life.  The  Church  has  al- 
ways been  greatest  when  it  was  poorest.  It 
was  when  Francis  of  Assisi  sacrificed  his 
wealth,  and  took  upon  himself  the  form  of 
a  servant,  that  he  became  a  leader  of  men. 

It  is  not  even  a  question  of  method.  There 
is  no  system  which  may  be  introduced  in 
the  Church  that  will  make  the  Church  uni- 
versally effective.  Many  a  church  con- 
ducted in  the  most  old-fashioned  manner, 
without  any  regard  for  modern  methods, 
has  been  highly  successful;  but  back  of  it 

93 


THE  CHURCH  AND  LABOR 

all,  there  was  the  spirit  which  attracted  the 
men. 

Workingmen  are  coming  to  believe  that 
their  salvation  will  depend  upon  themselves ; 
and  this  is  a  most  wholesome  spirit  to  en- 
courage. The  depressed  people  need  the 
assistance  which  the  Church  has  always 
been  rendering.  There  will  always  be  a  field 
for  philanthropy.  Men  will  still  be  called 
upon  to  render  service  to  their  fellow  men, 
but  never  should  there  be  a  sense  of  su- 
periority, even  when  ministering  to  the  low- 
liest. In  the  discussion  of  the  relation  of 
Church  and  Labor,  it  should  always  be 
remembered  that  we  are  dealing  with  two 
great  forces,  each  feeling  that  it  has  a  dis- 
tinct mission  in  the  world,  and  each  with  a 
justifiable  pride  in  its  history.  Neither  can 
afford  to  look  upon  the  other  with  a  spirit 
of  patronage. 

The  spirit  of  the  labor  movement  is  be- 
coming so  strongly  religious,  and  there  is  so 

94 


CHURCH  AND  LABOR  MAY  COOPERATE 

much  of  the  social  spirit  developing  in  the 
Church,  that  it  seems  altogether  possible 
that  some  day  Church  and  Labor  will  stand 
upon  a  common  platform.  But  should  either 
neglect  the  increasing  opportunity  which  is 
thus  coming  to  it,  it  will  then  become  a 
question  as  to  whether  the  Church  will 
capture  the  labor  movement,  or  whether  the 
labor  movement  will  capture  the  Church. 


.  ^',  0  .  >  , 

■>       J      *      >         o      e 


»  •   I       _  c  ^ 


A  SUGGESTED  LIST  OF  BOOKS 
ON  CHURCH  AND  LABOR 

Christianity  and  the  Social  Crisis,  by  Walter  Rauscen- 
busch.     Published  by  Macmillan  Co. 

The  Churches  and  the  Wage-Earners,  by  C.  B.  Thomp- 
son.    Published  by  Charles  Scribners'  Sons. 

Christianity's  Storm  Centre,  by  Charles  Stelzle.  Pub- 
lished by  Fleming  H.  Revell  Co. 

Christianity  and  the  Working  Classes,  by  George  Haw. 
Published  by  Macmillan  Co. 

The  World  as  the  Subject  of  Redemption,  by  Wm.  H. 
Freemantle.     Published  by  Longmans  Co. 

The  Institutional  Church,  by  Edward  Judson.  Published 
by  Lentilhon  &  Co. 

Working  with  the  People,  by  Charles  Sprague  Smith. 
Published  by  A.  Wessels  Co. 

Jesus  Christ  and  the  Social  Question,  by  Francis  G.  Pea- 
body.     Published  by  Macmillan  Co. 

The  Social  Problem  and  the  Churches'  Duty,  by  David 
Watson.     Published  by  A.  &  C.  Black. 

The  Bitter  Cry  of  the  Children,  by  John  Spargo.  Pub- 
lished by  Macmillan  Co. 

The  Church  and  the  Changing  Order,  by  Shailer  Math- 
ews.    Published  by  Macmillan  Co. 

Some  Ethical  Phases  of  the  Labor  Question,  by  Carroll 
D.  Wright.     Published  by  the  Amer.  Unitarian  Ass'n. 


CAMBRIDGE  .  MASSACHUSETTS 
U    .    S    .   A 


MODERN 

RELIGIOUS 

PROBLEMS 


EDITED  BY 

DR.  AMBROSE  W.  VERNON 


For  a  long  time  there  has  been  an  atmosphere  of 
nncertainty  in  the  religious  realm.  This  uncertainty 
has  been  caused  by  the  widespread  knowledge  that 
modem  scholarship  has  modified  the  traditional  con- 
ceptions of  the  Christian  religion,  and  particularly  by 
widespread  ignorance  of  the  precise  modifications  to 
which  modern  scholarship  has  been  led. 

The  aim  of  this  series  of  books  is  to  lay  before  the 
great  body  of  intelligent  people  in  the  English-speak- 
ing world  the  precise  results  of  this  scholarship,  so 
that  men  both  within  and  without  the  churches  may 
be  able  to  understand  the  conception  of  the  Christian 
religion  (and  of  its  Sacred  Books)  which  obtains 
among  its  leading  scholars  to-day,  and  that  they  may 
intelligently  cooperate  in  the  great  practical  problems 
with  which  the  churches  are  now  confronted. 

While  at  many  a  point  divergent  views  are  cham- 
pioned, it  has  become  apparent  in  the  last  few  years 
that  it  is  possible  to  speak  of  a  consensus  of  opinion 
among  the  leading  scholars  of  England  and  America, 
who  have,  in  general,  adopted  the  modern  point  of 
view. 


The  publishers  and  editor  congratulate  themselves 
that  this  consensus  of  opinion  may  be  presented  to 
the  public  not  by  middle-men,  but  by  men  who  from 
their  position  and  attainment  are  recognized  through- 
out the  English  Protestant  world  as  among  those  best 
able  to  speak  with  authority  on  the  most  important 
subjects  which  face  intelligent  religious  men  to-day. 
It  is  a  notable  sign  of  the  times  that  these  eminent 
specialists  have  gladly  consented  to  pause  in  their  de- 
tailed research,  in  order  to  acquaint  the  religious 
public  with  the  results  of  their  study. 

Modem  Religious  Problems  are  many,  but  they 
fall  chiefly  under  one  of  the  four  divisions  into  which 
this  series  of  books  is  to  be  divided :  — 

I.   The  Old  Testament. 
II.   The  New  Testament. 

III.  Fundamental  Christian  Conceptions. 

IV.  Practical  Church  Problems. 

Under  these  four  main  divisions  the  most  vital 
problems  will  be  treated  in  short,  concise,  clear  vol- 
umes. They  will  leave  technicalities  at  one  side  and 
they  will  be  published  at  a  price  which  will  put  the 
assured  results  of  religious  scholarship  within  the 
reach  of  all. 

The  volumes  already  arranged  for  are  the  following  c 

I.   OLD  TESTAMENT 

"THE    ORIGIN     AND     DEVELOPMENT    OF     THE 
LAW."     By  Canon  S.  R.  DRIVER,  Oxford  University. 

"HOW  WE  GOT  OUR  OLD  TESTAMENT." 

By  Professor  WILLIAM  R.  ARNOLD,  Andover  Semin- 
ary. 

"THE   PRIMITIVE  RELIGION  OF   ISRAEL." 

By  Professor  L.  B.  PATON,  Hartford  Theological  Semi»» 
ary. 


II.   NEW  TESTAMENT 

"THE  EARLIEST  SOURCES  FOR  THE  LIFE  OP 
JESUS."  By  Professor  F.  C.  BURKITT,  Cambridge  Uni- 
versity,  England.     (Now  Ready.) 

••THE   MIRACLES  OF   JESUS." 

By  Professor  F.  C.  PORTER,  Yale  University. 

"THE   FOUNDING  OF  THE  CHURCH." 

By   Professor  B.   W.    BACON,   Yale    University.    (Now 
Ready.) 

"HOW  WE  GOT  OUR  NEW  TESTAMENT." 
By  Professor  J.  H.  ROPES,  Harvard  University. 

-PAUL  AND   PAULINISM." 

By  Rev.  JAMES  MOFFATT,  D.   D.,   Broughty  Ferry, 
Forfarshire,  Scotland.   (Now  Ready.) 

"THE  HISTORICAL  AND  RELIGIOUS  VALUE  OF 
THE  FOURTH  GOSPEL."  By  Professor  E.  F.  SCOTT, 
Queen's  University,  Kingston.    (Now  Ready.) 

•'THE  BIRTH  AND  RESURRECTION  OF  OUR 
LORD."  By  Professor  WILLIAM  H.  RYDER,  of  And- 
over  Seminary,  Cambridge,  Mass. 

III.   FUNDAMENTAL   CHRISTIAN 
CONCEPTIONS 

"THE  GOSPEL  OF  JESUS."  ,     .    ,  o      • 

By  Professor  G.  W.  KNOX,  Union  Theological  Seminary. 
New  York.    With  General  Introduction  to  the  Sones.    (N  ow 

Ready.) 

"THE  GOD  OF  THE  CHRISTIAN."     ^    ,     .    , -^ 
By  Professor  A.  C.  McGIFFERT,  Umon  Theological  Sem- 

inary. 

"SIN   AND  ITS  FORGIVENESS."  . 

By  President  WILLIAM  DeW.  HYDE,  Bowdoin  CoUege. 
(Now  Ready.) 

*THE   PERSON  OF   JESUS." 

By  President  H.  C.  KING,  Oberlin  College. 

-THE   AUTHORITY  OF  THE   SCRIPTURES^ 

By  Profe«or  SHAILER  MATHEWS.  University  of  Ch»- 
cago. 


IV.   PRACTICAL  CHURCH   PROBLEMS 

"THE  PLACE  OF  THE  CHURCH  IN  MODERN 
SOCIETY."  By  WM.  JEWETT  TUCKER,  Ex-jeresi- 
dent  of  Dartmouth  College. 

••THE  CHURCH  AND   LABOR." 

By  CHARLES  STELZLE,  Superintendent  of  Departmeat 
of  the  Church  and  Labor  of  the  Presbyterian  Church  of  the 
United  States.    (Now  Ready.) 

*'THE  ADJUSTMENT  OF  THE  BIBLE  SCHOOLS 
TO  MODERN  NEEDS."  By  Professor  CHARLES  F. 
KENT,  Yale  University. 

"THE  CHURCH  AND  THE  CHILD." 

By  Rev.  HENRY   SLOANE   COFFIN,  Madison  Ave. 

Presbyterian  Church,  New  York  City. 

"THE  PRESENTATION  OF  RELIGION  TO  EDU- 
CATED MEN."  By  Rev.  GEORGE  HODGES,  D.  D., 
Dean  of  the  Episcopal  Theological  School,  Cambridge, 
Mass. 

The  general  editor  of  the  series,  Rev.  Ambrose 
White  Vernon,  is  a  graduate  of  Princeton  University 
(1891)  and  of  Union  Theological  Seminary  (1894). 
After  two  years  more  of  study  in  Germany,  on  a  fel- 
lowship, he  had  an  experience  of  eight  years  in  the 
pastorate,  at  Hiawatha,  Kansas,  and  East  Orange, 
New  Jersey.  From  1904  to  1907  he  was  professor  of 
Biblical  literature  in  Dartmouth  College,  and  then 
professor  of  practical  theology  at  Yale  till  the  present 
year,  when  he  returned  to  the  pastorate,  succeeding 
the  late  Dr.  Reuen  Thomas  at  Harvard  Church, 
Brookline,  one  of  the  leading  churches  of  metropoli- 
tan Boston.  Dartmouth  College  gave  him  the  de- 
gree of  D.  D.  in  1907. 

The  volumes  are  attractively  bound  in  cloth.    Thin 
i2mo,  each  ^o  cents  net.    Postage  j  cents. 

HOUGHTON   MIFFLIN   COMPANY 
4  Park  St.,  Boston  :  85  Fifth  Ave.,  New  York 


jp-NT-^TTA    T,TT>T-  ■  -  ^ 


14  DAY  USE 

RBTORN  TO  DESK  FROM  WHICH  BORROWED 

LOAN  DEPT. 


(G4427sl0^47fiT} 


General  Library 


sTo 


>lv' 


